


Extended Family

by pherryt, TheAuthorGod



Series: Extended Family ASMB [Fic and Art] [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: ASMB 2017, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Asexual Character, Asexual Supernatural Mini Bang 2016-17, Asexual Umbrella, Asexuality, Demisexual Castiel (Supernatural), Demisexuality, F/F, F/M, Features Art by Dragonpressgraphics, Grey-Asexual Castiel (Supernatural), M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Reads like One-Sided Attraction, Soulmates, Soulmates Castiel & Dean Winchester, color soulmates, colorverse, dragonpressgraphics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-10-27 03:38:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10800903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAuthorGod/pseuds/TheAuthorGod
Summary: Dean has been uprooted and replanted in so many places, in so many communities, that he wonders what it feels like to truly belong somewhere.  When he moves into his family's newest place, he figures it's just another pit stop before he's off to another, however things change when he sees the boy next door and his colors start to come in.But if Dean's just starting to see in color, what does that really mean?  When people meet their soulmates, all of their colors are supposed to show up.  Whatever it is, Dean's intrigued.





	1. Home is Just a Place

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoy!!! This story has been one of my favorite (yet painstaking) projects this year!!!
> 
> I want to thank my AMAZING partner (the artist) [dragonpressgraphics](http://dragonpressgraphics.tumblr.com)
> 
> and my lovely beta, [ambersagen](http://ambersagen.tumblr.com)
> 
> You should go show them some love too!! Anyway, ENJOY!!

 

Despite the fact that he’d moved all of his belongings into the nooks and crannies of the new place, Dean’s room was still bare. Some people would say that it didn’t seem homey. And Dean tended to agree, but they’d never been in one place long enough for him to acquire a sense of home. How would he know what a home should feel like after living in place after place after place?  
  
After his father died, they’d moved around a lot, never staying in one place more than a year. There was one place, somewhere in Ohio, that they only stayed for two months. He was the new kid twice that school year. Of course, he was always the new kid.  
  
Sammy pushed through Dean’s door. “Hey, you done?” His mop of hair was way too long. If it had been up to Dean, Sam’s hair would be buzzed. He wasn’t entirely sure why Sam endured the teasing and kept his long hair. Probably had something to do with the fact that Mom called it his ‘handsome mane’.  
  
Shrugging, Dean folded down the last box and threw it on the pile he’d tuck into his closet, ready and there for when they no doubt would move again. Hell, he was almost 18. Maybe the next time he moved, he’d be going by himself. “Yeah, I guess. You got your stuff in your room?”  
  
Ignoring his question, Sam walked over to Dean’s bed and flopped backward onto it. “I feel good about this move.”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Mmm-hmm. Maybe this is the town where I’ll finally meet her?” His pupils practically turned to hearts.  
  
Dean rolled his eyes. “You say that about every move.” He shut his closet door and spun to glare at his brother.  
  
Ever since Sam lost his colors at 4, all he’d cared about was finding them again. He’d cried for weeks, making himself sick with snot and dehydration. It had been ugly. Dean remembered losing his colors, but he didn’t think he was as sad about it as his brother had been. But, he’d lost his colors at the same time he had lost his Dad; it sort of just rolled into one horrible thing, becoming a ‘big kid’ all at once.  
  
Crossing his arms across his chest, Sam harrumphed. “Yeah, but I especially feel it this time. And…” he dragged it out, sitting up and grinning wide, “I’m starting high school, so even more kids to meet, to see, to talk to.”  
  
“Sam, why aren’t you in your room? You haven’t finished unpacking yet!” Mom’s voice came through the door; actually, it was so loud that it came through the walls too.  
  
Dean chuckled while Sam hopped up and ran from the room, fear etched into his features. There was nothing scarier than Mom when she was mad.  
  
School didn’t start for a few more weeks, so Dean planned to spend the time surfing the internet. However, his mother, for all the accomplishments she’d managed to see through being a widow and single mother, still had some ‘hot mess’ moments.  
  
They didn’t have internet yet.  
  
He trod down the stairs, quiet enough not to disturb his brother’s reprimanding. Not wanting to point out that she’d forgotten it, Dean checked the messages and made in the call to the best internet provider in the area. They wouldn’t be more expensive than the last place, but it would be a few days before they would send a guy out, overbooked or something.  
  
Despite that he knew he had to walk up to the Starbucks for wifi, periodically Dean would open up his phone and try to check his email. They had data, but it wasn’t the unlimited plan. He and Sam’s phones dipped into the same data pool and Sam had a horrible sense of direction. Dean wasn’t sure if Sam knew it, but he turned data off on his own phone to make sure that Sam had as much as possible.  
  
Flopping onto the sofa and looking at his phone, Dean had to laugh. There were 5 locked wifis and 3 of them were named in a way that blamed someone called Gabriel for ‘breaking’ them.  
  
He looked around for the newspaper, but it wasn’t on the coffee table or end table, which meant it was still out on the front step. He growled low in his throat at the ceiling before getting up to fetch it.  
  
“Fuck you, Gabriel!”  


  
Next door, a blond kid maybe Dean’s age, maybe older, ran from the house to the car. “It’s not my fault that you can’t put your shit away.”  
  
“You’re not fucking lactose intolerant!” Another guy, this one with dark hair and a scowl, came through the door waving a menacing hand at who Dean would guess was Gabriel.  
  
The shiny sports car revved up and backed out of the drive way. Gabriel rolled down the window and waved.  
  
Dean caught sight of a shit-eating grin through the window.  
  
“Buy more almond milk while you’re at it!” The dark-haired guy flipped him off before pivoting to go back inside. “How am I going to have cereal before work? Fuck.”  
  
“Do you like cashew milk?” Dean piped up. His mother had issues with milk during her period, which yes, Dean knew about. He was the one that needed the explanation as to why they needed two milks and he seemed to piss his mother off just enough to get her to give him the real reasoning. Sam seemed to like the cashew milk, too.  
  
The guy turned.  
  
And suddenly, things looked different. Dean couldn’t figure it out at first, but slowly it dawned on him.  
  
Colors.  
  
He could see colors. The grass was green and the sky was blue and the shutters were deep red. But, at the same time, everything looked kind of muted. Okay, really muted. He thought back to what the ocean looked like when he was little. He just…  
  
The colors weren’t amazing enough for him to be surprised. It was dull. It didn’t make sense.  
  
“It’s not my favorite. Are you lactose intolerant, too?” The guy was frozen on his porch. He didn’t act like he could suddenly see colors.  
  
For that reason and because the colors were still muted, Dean didn’t say anything. Maybe it was a lapse of judgment. Maybe he was just crazy. He didn’t want to do anything weird, so he just shook his head. “Nah, my mom prefers the stuff. You want some?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
The guy was pretty forward. After the spectacle with Gabriel, Dean had expected him to be high-strung, like Sam. But the guy was muted, like he didn’t care one way or another. That meant that Gabriel-guy must have really pissed him off. Dean thought it was kind of funny, so he cracked a smile. “Come on. I’ll get it.” He waved the guy over and turned back into the house, leaving the door open behind him.  
  
“So, I take it all of those wifis come from your house? How did he manage to screw them all up?”  
  
The guy followed, also leaving the door open. Dean couldn’t blame him; it was probably weird following a strange guy into the next house over. Of course, Dean felt like he knew him, like they were connected now. Dean had his colors – or at least some of his colors? – because of this guy.  
  
He didn’t even know his name.  
  
“Yeah. My brother is an ass. He messed up the password on one. He managed to overheat the router on another. And the last one stopped working with no explanation, but we all know it was probably him.” Having followed Dean to the kitchen, he looked around at the boxes that were still in the room. “Welcome to the neighborhood, I guess.” He leaned on the counter.  
  
Opening the fridge and pushing the half-gallon of regular milk to the side, Dean grabbed the cashew milk. He could see the color in the carrots and the broccoli, and it was definitely a myth that the color made them look more appetizing. That had been one of his mother’s favorite ways to get him to eat vegetables, but they still looked gross as somewhat-colored vegetables. “There should be enough for a bowl of cereal. You can just have it.” He handed it over.  
  
“Thanks.” The guy turned and started toward the door.  
  
Huffing, Dean moved to follow. “Wait, I don’t know your name.”  
  
“What? That the payment for the cashew milk?”  
  
“Actually, if we’re talking payment, I’d much prefer access to your wifi. We don’t have any yet.”  
  
It was an awkward moment. “Yeah, okay.”  
  
Dean looked around, kind of embarrassed since it had half-way been a joke. Where he looked, other things had that light wash of color, too. It was really underwhelming. “I was sort of joking…”  
  
The guy tucked the carton under his arm and held out his hand. “Phone?”  
  
“Yeah, okay this is happening.” Dean pulled his phone from his pajama pants pocket and unlocked it. He handed it over. He just prayed that he didn’t open safari or his tinder or something that would embarrass him even further. Honestly, he didn’t know this guy; why was he turning over his phone?  
  
Well, the world didn’t end.  
  
He returned Dean’s phone and continued to the door. Dean followed behind him feeling like that dog that followed Sam around for two weeks back in Illinois. He kind of just wanted to follow… dammit. “If you don’t tell me your name, I’m gonna have to assign one to you. And I’m really bad at naming.” Dean just wanted to keep talking. Is this how color matches worked? Obviously not, otherwise he’d have all of his colors. Is this how soulmates worked? Well, his colors were already broken so probably not.  
  
The guy was off of the front porch and halfway across the lawn back to his house.  
  
Dean felt the urge to keep talking. “And, I mean baaaaad at naming. Like the kind of bad that means that when I have kids I’ll end up naming them after rock bands and bass guitarists or my partner is gonna have to name them or-”  
  
It was strange. The guy turned around again, and, when their eyes met that time, Dean’s colors became a tiny bit brighter.  
  
“You’re gay?”  
  
“Well, I’m bi. But don’t try to change the subject. I’m trying to say that I’ll call you something dumb like ‘Cashew’ if you don’t tell me a better name.” Dean blushed little bit. The amount of red that tinged his face was still more than the amount of red the tinged the shutters and stripes of the flags hung on some of the houses.  
  
The guy shrugged, “Cashew’s fine.” With that, he turned and took his cashew milk into his house.  
  
Dean was thoroughly confused.  
  
\---  
  
With wifi on his phone, Dean did some research into colors. First, he ended up googling how to turn off the colors on his phone. The strange shade of colors he was experiencing was annoying and the less he had to deal with it the better. There was a way to do it under accessibility and it was easy enough to switch off. He also added in a shortcut so that he could switch back and forth in the future.  
  
Wikipedia had too much information on the subject. He’d ended up hopping from one highlighted link to another until he settled on “Staged Color Progression”.  
  
Staged Color Progression was a rare way to gain your colors back. Science couldn’t explain it and psycolorgists had to deal with it on a case-by-case basis. Dean didn’t have the money or resources to go about it the healthy way, though, so he settled on trying to be Cashew’s friend.  
  
Cashew, what a dumb thing to call someone.  
  
The thought reverberated through his head all day. Through checking his email, through running errands. He couldn’t get Cashew out of his head, the guy or the dumb name he’d assigned him.  
  
“Hey, Cashew!” Dean stepped out of the car and waved at their neighbor. Cashew was sitting on the steps in front of his house. He raised a single hand in reply, not really a wave.  
  
Sam scurried around the car and made a pointed look between the two. “Cashew?” He wrinkled his nose.  
  
Rolling his eyes, Dean shut the door to the impala and pushed Sam toward the house. Despite that Sam was shorter than him now, Dean knew that one day he’d be taller than him. The kid kept having growth spurts and was already to Dean’s ears despite Dean having 4 years on him. “Don’t you have school supplies to organize, nerd?”  
  
Jerking up his shoulders and making a bitchface, Sam screwed up his nose. With that, Sam turned, stomping into the house to play with his new highlighters and pencils.  
  
Dean crossed the lawn and stopped in front of Cashew. “So, how are you, now?”  
  
Cashew looked up and, though his face was neutral, Dean could tell somewhere in his gut that he was happy. “Pretty good, actually.”  
  
Dean’s colors took another saturation growth spurt. He could see that Cashew’s eyes were going to be some sort of blue at the end of all of this. Part of him couldn’t wait. Why couldn’t he just get all of his colors at once? What was wrong with him? Why was he broken? “Yeah? What happened? That brother of yours get put in his place?” Dean chuckled for good measure. Did he know this guy well enough to make a joke like that? No, but he felt like he did. They were becoming soulmates or something, right? Isn’t that what the color thing meant?  
  
Shifting, Cashew tilted his head. His sharp features caught the sunlight and Dean couldn’t believe how angelic the guy looked. His skin was darker than Dean’s, but it seemed to glow like clouds at sunset. Dean could even make out the beginning of a 5 o’clock shadow. This guy was already attractive and Dean could already imagine the ways he would fill out. How he would look once he grew into his somewhat lanky arms. Dean’s mouth watered.  
  
These were not the kind of thoughts he had expected to have when he walked over. Wikipedia had said something about people who experience Staged Color Progression tend to take more time to fall in love with their soulmate, that they would take longer to get hit with the mushy, chick-flick crap.  
  
Yet here Dean was, comparing Cashew to a sunset and dreaming about a future with him. Maybe he was really broken?  
  
“You okay there?” Cashew’s hand came up to his shoulder. His fingertips seemed to burn Dean where they pressed to his shoulder through his shirts.  
  
Dean’s colors blinked further into existence. They still weren’t anything like how he remembered them, part of him wondered how long it would take. Would he ever have all of his colors? “Yeah,” he shook off Cashew’s hand, “I’m good.”


	2. Grey-Color Alliance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean ends up at a GCA (Grey-Color Alliance) meeting because the email came from the one and only Castiel Milton. And, dammit, he was nosy.

He hadn’t really taken the whole thing seriously. Sometimes, people write their names and emails on club sign-up lists just for the heck of it. Maybe so that they could walk away from the table or because they want to get their brother off their back about making friends and such.  
  
Dean had put his contact info on 3 sign-up sheets on teacher night at the beginning of the year: Men’s Field Hockey Team, Robotics and Engineering Team, and the Grey-Color Alliance. He’d only really meant the one that he’d put on the Robotics and Engineering Team.  
  
In fact, he was about to block the emails from the other clubs when something caught his eye. The president – at least, that’s what Dean guessed since they were in charge of emailing new recruits – was Anna Milton, aka his neighbor.  
  
And yeah, he’d been curious, so he had opened the email.  
  
The second email was the one and only Castiel Milton, and, at that point, Dean was basically hooked. He put the information for the first meeting into his phone and set 3 different reminders.  
  
So, those were the (un)fortunate events that brought Dean to the GCA’s door. It was an English classroom on the English Department hallway and in the door’s window were colorful letters “GCA”.  
  
Stealing himself, he pushed the door open and entered the room.  
  
There was free food. Dean tried not to realize just how pathetic he was based on the fact that he was there more to spy on Castiel than for the free food.  
  
“Okay, everyone. Newbies in those chairs. Current members at the front of the room.” Anna Milton pointed to the desks and then to the white board at the front of the room.  
  
Following her instructions, Dean made his way to the back of the room and took a seat by the window. Outside he could see a few sports teams sharing the pitch, holding recruitment for their fall teams. Part of him wondered why he hadn’t ended up down there, in the gray-green grass, under the grey-blue sky.  
  
But he would always be plagued with the colors. He would be reminded of it wherever he ended up, so he might as well investigate it. He turned around.  
  
It was only then that he realized that he was surrounded by freshman and sophomores. Ugh. He rolled his eyes and hunched over the desk. He stuck out from this crowd so much that Castiel and Anna couldn’t possibly miss him if he tried. Why did he decide to do this again?  
  
The current members – there were only 5 of them? – started giving little speeches.  
  
“I’m Anna Milton and I’m the president of the GCA. I’m the one that sent you all the email to be here. I have my colors.” There was a sudden rush of murmuring from the freshmen and sophomores. “I’ve had my colors for 5 years.” She made a sweeping motion to her brother.  
  
Castiel cleared his throat. “I’m Castiel.”  
  
A faint inkling of color added into Dean’s vision, still not even a wash of color over the usual greyscale. Dean almost growled in frustration.  
  
“I am social secretary; I run the twitter, facebook, and newsletter, which you will get even when you don’t join,” he deadpanned.  
  
Dean wasn’t sure if he was joking or not, but his sister gave a forced chuckle to fill the pause.  
  
Taking a breath and blinking, Castiel finished up, “I do not have my colors but consider myself a strong ally after dealing with my sister and her match for the past 5 years.”  
  
Looking to the ground, Dean tried not to feel like he’d been punched in the gut. Why didn’t Cas have his colors? Was Dean imagining it? Was he going crazy?  
  
“I’m Benny. I’m just a regular member and I don’t have my colors.” A hulking guy made a small bow to the room.  
  
A different murmur erupted in the feminine majority of the audience.  
  
“I’m Garth. I’m the Vice President. I have colors, but not because I found my true mate. I was in an accident when I was younger giving me my colors. I was in the hospital for 3 years afterward, so I don’t recommend it.” He gave a little smile, an encouraging one.  
  
Part of Dean felt as if Garth could be a good person to confide in. He had colors but no soulmate, kinda like Dean? Maybe? Dean had his colors-ish, but he didn’t seem to illicit the same thing in his soulmate.  
  
God, this was all kinds of messed up.  
  
Another red head stepped forward from the line-up. She was the last one and he seemed to be a ball of energy. “I’m Charlie,” she gave a little wave, “I’m Anna’s true mate, so I’ve had my colors for 5 years.”  
  
More whispering erupted after that. People were hiding their mouths behind their hands and leaning into each other’s space. They weren’t being sneaky, just secretive.  
  
At the front of the room, Castiel’s hands balled into fists and his eyebrows furrowed. Honestly, Dean wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been there specifically to spy on him. Castiel’s lips twitched twice before he stepped forward, “Now we’re done introducing ourselves. Please,” he motioned to the door, “if you were only here for the pizza, leave.” He leveled a stare with the now silent audience.  
  
Even Dean felt guilty under the gaze, even though he hadn’t made any comment about Charlie and Anna’s matching. How could he comment on it? His – albeit unconventional – color match was of the same sex as well.  
  
After a few beats of silence and Anna glaring at Castiel from just behind and to the left of him, over half of the audience stood and filed out, silently.  
  
“Now,” Castiel turned around and picked up a poster tube that had been propped against the wall behind him, “about our club.”  
  
Anna heaved a sigh and seemed to resign herself to helping her brother. When he offered her a corner of the poster, she took it and plastered a smile onto her face. “This is the GCA flag.”  
  
The poster was flag-shaped. The first half of the flag was divided equally between a white portion and a black portion, while the second half had 6 colored stripes starting with red and ending at violet, a rainbow.  
  
Hopping forward, Charlie gestured to the flag. “This side is black and white symbolizing life without colors.” She moved pointed to the latter side. “Despite that the probably vast majority of you can’t see it, this side is multicolored. This stripe is red, then orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet. That side symbolizes life with colors.” She gave a broad smile before stepping back in line and tucking her hands behind her back, puffing her chest out with pride.  
  
They must have rehearsed most of the presentation.  
  
Garth brought his hands together like he was clapping but with no force or sound behind it. “Now, our club isn’t a match-making society. Our activities aren’t supposed to help you find your match.”  
  
It was pulpable how much attention from the remaining audience was lost on that sentence. Dean couldn’t believe that they were so selfish to think that the club was supposed to help them find their match. But, at the same time, they were freshmen and sophomores.  
  
Come to think of it… It’s a good thing Sam hadn’t taken a fancy to this society. With his strange obsession with color matches, it was a surprise that he hadn’t been interested in the club.  
  
“Mostly what we do is try to organize talks with local university teachers to learn more about color matches and how the color process works and you’re more than welcome to attend the lectures without joining the club.” He opened his clasped hands to the room. “Any questions?”  
  
Awkward silence filled the room.  
  
Anna took a quick step forward. “So, do any of you have your colors?” She raised her gray-red eyebrows in anticipation.  
  
Suddenly, Dean’s elbows felt like lead weight. If he said yes, they’d ask how long and who with or how come and he wasn’t ready for that. Instead, he settled for looking around the classroom hoping for other hands.  
  
Unfortunately, every other person was looking around as well.  
  
Huffing in frustration, Dean deposited his chin onto his crossed arms.  
  
“Now that you know how this works, if you want to join, stay and, if you don’t want to join, leave.” Castiel was an absolute ray of sunshine; wasn’t he? Wow.  
  
Everyone else collected their things and left.  
  
Benny stepped out of line and took a seat at one of the vacated desks and Charlie deflated when the door closed after the last potential member left.  
  
Looking at Dean, Garth gave a little wave. “Hi! How are you?”  
  
And then all 10 eyes were on him. Actually, that was a lie. 8 eyes were on him. Castiel was turned away rolling up the poster and putting it back into the tube.  
  
Clearing his throat, Dean sat straight up. “Uh, good. How are you?”  
  
“Could be better.” Garth offered the same little, encouraging smile as he had before. “What’s your name?”  
  
“His name is Dean.” Castiel said it to the wall but loud enough that it was undeniable. “He lives next door to Anna and me. He’s probably here because he thought he had a chance with Anna. Well, you don’t.” When he turned around, he sent his disdain at Dean through his steely gaze. It took only a few nanoseconds for the look to melt away, though.  
  
Dean was surprised? Embarrassed? Castiel was right when he said that Dean was there to see if he had a chance with someone, but it wasn’t Anna. Dean settled on hurt; what had he done to Castiel that made him think so low of him?  
  
Taking a sudden step forward, Cas reached a hand in Dean’s direction, simply a gesture since they were on opposite sides of the room. “I’m sorry. I’m just-” He brought a hand up to scrub down his face. “People don’t usually join, and, when they do, they’ve always had… ulterior motives.”  
  
“Nah, man, it’s, uh… it’s cool.” Dean tried to look anywhere but Castiel, but the hints of color all over the room only replaced the thought of Castiel to the forefront of his brain. He remedied the situation by closing his eyes. “I just wanted to join to, uh, to learn more about it. My parents had an unconventional color match and that sort of thing can be genetic so… yeah.” Some of it was absolute bullshit. His mother never talked about her and John’s color match; but the genetic thing was straight from the Staged Color Progression Wikipedia page.  
  
Benny swiveled in his seat. “I say if Mr. grumps hasn’t scared you away that you’re perfect GCA member material.” He reached his hand out across the desk that separated the front and back rows of desks. “Welcome to the club.”  
  
Rocking up out of the chair, Dean grabbed his hand and gave a quick shake. “Nice to meet you.”  
  
“How about we pull the desks together a bit and discuss some of the upcoming events?” Anna started nudging a desk and chair at the front row.  
  
Garth swung a gangly leg over a chair and jerked it and the accompanying desk around. “Sounds good to me.” While the others took seats and moved their tables into an impromptu, organic shape, Garth turned to Dean. “Are you planning on joining any other clubs? We’re not a really strict club, but some of the others are.”  
  
Nodding along, Dean trained his eyes on Garth, ignoring the clattering from the rest of the members. “I was thinking of joining the Engineering and Robotics Team.” He shrugged.  
  
“Oh, I’m on that. As long as you have a good record with math and physics, you’re a sure thing. It’s a good club, but it only really has meetings in March and April just before the Robotics Tournament.” Charlie sent Dean a thumbs up where she’d draped herself backwards over a chair near Benny.  
  
Castiel took a seat next to Dean. He didn’t look at Dean or pay him any mind at all.  
  
Swallowing the awkward bubbling in his throat, Dean looked to the other members of the club and nodded to them. They seemed like nice people and he didn’t have any friends. What did he have to lose? “Cool.” He nodded and turned toward Castiel whose head was bent over a printed agenda for the meeting. Dean repeated, “Cool.”


	3. Giving Thanks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The GCA does Thanksgiving!!!

School had gotten out early since it was the day before Thanksgiving Break. Castiel had argued that they should still meet this week and Charlie had offered her house after school. Dean had never been there before, so Castiel pointed the way from his passenger seat.  
  
“Take a left up here and it’s the third house on the right.”  
  
Luckily for Dean, Castiel had warmed up to him a bit. Somewhere between Dean not trying to date his sister and taking Cas’ side in arguments, they’d become friends. And Dean could be happy with that. The colors had stopped progressing as quickly. Instead of getting more colors every time he saw Cas, he might get some each week, more likely every two weeks or so.  
  
Dean could see enough color that he could see the blue of Cas’ eyes across the room, but at the same time he couldn’t see the different yellows and oranges of the falling leaves. They either looked yellow or orange and nothing in between. It made some activities extremely annoying, like watching low budget sitcoms.  
  
He was pretty sure that it wouldn’t be that annoying if he had all of his colors and he wouldn’t even bat an eye at it if he was watching in greyscale. It was just this awkward in between that made it so frustrating. And worse than that, he had no one to complain too. He was still just a Grey Ally in the club and he wasn’t sure how to go about telling his mom or anyone about it.  
  
It just wasn’t normal. It meant he was broken. They may even tell him to go to a doctor or something and Dean really didn’t like doctors so… he’d decided to take his chances with frustration management.  
  
Cas made a beeline to Charlie’s door and rang the doorbell. Dean chuckled, opening the back door of the impala to get the two casserole dishes and a bowl. It was Thanksgiving, so they had decided to bring food.  
  
When Dean had told his mother, she had given him the whole kitchen yesterday night and order pizza for their dinner. Dean liked to cook. Part of him couldn’t wait to have a family of his own that he could cook for, but that thought came with a one-way ticket to the section of his brain that had become dedicated to Cas, where he catalogued his favorite foods and animals and fonts. By the way, they were honey buns and burgers, bees and cats, and Helvetica.  
  
Anyway, Dean brought a bread pudding sort of thing that tasted like honey buns, some homemade mac and cheese, and a 7-layer bean dip. Garth had said he’d get chips and Dean had made sure to tell him to bring some of the tortilla variety. Garth had pointed finger-guns at Dean with a quick ‘You got it!’  
  
Dean lit at Cas’ side at the door. “So, Charlie and Anna are already here?”  
  
“Yeah. Charlie wanted to get everything cleaned up, so they left right at the bell.” He glanced at Dean holding all of the dishes and quickly grabbed one. “Sorry, forgot you brought so much food.” He tried to peek into the casserole carrier he’d taken.  
  
Nudging him with his elbow, Dean tutted at him. “No peeking. It’s a thanksgiving surprise.” He flashed a grin.  
  
Cas lowered his hands and the casserole carrier to his knees. “I don’t like surprises.”  
  
“I know, but you’ll like at least one of these dishes. I can guarantee it.” He winked. Was he flirting? If he was, he needed to stop.  
  
Luckily the door opened before Dean could say anything more. Anna pulled pushed the screen door out and waved them in. “Come on in. Charlie’s setting up the basement. You can put the food on the ping pong table for now.” She pointed to a door leading to a set of stair going down.  
  
“Aren’t you coming?”  
  
“No, you and Dean go down. I just got a text from Garth saying that he’s turning onto Sycamore Drive, so I’m going to wait to let him in.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Dean waited until Cas had caught up to him at the door to the basement before making his way down.  
  
The basement was set up almost like an arcade and Dean thought he may swoon. There were two arcade game kiosks – Pac-Man and Galaga, a ping pong table, an air hockey table, and a huge television complete with a Blu-ray player and an Xbox.  
  
Leaving the dishes on the ping pong table as instructed, Dean moved to look around the room. There was a big comfy sectional sofa centered in front of the television and there were at least 5 full shelves of DVDs, Blu-rays, and Xbox Games. “This is like heaven.”  
  
“It’s a bit dark to be heaven.” Cas’ quip was almost immediate.  
  
Dean had learned that this was Cas’ sense of humor, and, honestly, it was pretty funny in the right environment. He shot a ‘I get it’ grin in Cas’ direction.  
  
“It gets pretty bright once we get this baby turned on.” Charlie popped her head up from the other side of the sofa. She was sitting on the floor with batteries and Xbox controllers. “It’s kinda like a movie theatre.”  
  
“Well, I like it.” Dean circled around to the other side of the couch and took a seat next to Charlie on the floor. “So, what are our game options?” He reached toward the stack of Xbox games. “Oh cool, you have Supernatural? That only came out last month!” He flipped over the case and read the inscription.  
  
Charlie popped out old batteries from a clear Xbox controlled and grabbed new ones from the pack to her left. “It’s good, but you can tell that the developers didn’t have their colors yet; well, you can’t but I can. The color balance is off. You can have it if you want.” She smiled at him. “I just can’t play it, you know?”  
  
Grip loosening on the game, Dean suddenly had a picture of the game with opposing solid colors and could feel himself grow nauseous. If someone with all of their colors couldn’t handle it, he couldn’t stand a chance. “Thanks, Charlie, but I couldn’t.” He put it back on the pile. “If you can’t play it, why is it in the pile?”  
  
She shrugged collecting the remaining batteries and standing up. “I’m not the only person playing. I thought maybe you or Cas or Benny might enjoy it.” She left, presumably, to put the batteries away, maybe to check on Anna too.  
  
It was times like this that Dean really wished that his colors had come all the way in. He’d been looking forward to the game for almost a year, but now he wouldn’t be able to enjoy it. It fucking sucked.  
  
“It’s not very good. You can only play as a supernatural hunter. The characters have limited storyline and graphics for the female characters are much worse than for the male characters.” Castiel had taken a seat behind Dean on the sectional. He leaned back into the overstuffed cushions. “The company has been advertising a sequel game where you can play as hunters, angels, or demons. Personally, I’m waiting for that one. Although, I’m not entirely sure if they’ll fix the female graphics or color balance.”  
  
Dean nodded. “So, you like video games?” Dean turned sideways to better look at Cas while he talked.  
  
Shrugging, Castiel seemed to sink further into the couch. “I play them for a while then I forget about them for a while.”  
  
That made sense with everything else Dean knew about Cas. And, just like everything else about Cas, the new information was filed away in that Cas-only section of Dean’s thoughts.  
  
“And the party has started!” Garth jumped down the last two steps of the basement stairs and held up 6 different bags of chips. “And, yes, I remembered the tortilla chips.”  
  
Benny snorted. “Yeah, he remembered them when I was driving passed the grocery store so we had to stop and get some.” He threw his coat over the back of the sofa and poked at one of the casserole dish carriers. “What other food do we have?”  
  
Waving her hands in the air, Anna entered the room with Charlie close behind her. “All will be revealed soon enough, so everyone gather around.” She took Garth’s hand in one of hers and Charlie’s in the other.  
  
Cas stood and offered a hand to Dean to help him up, which Dean took. And, much to Dean’s emotional distress, he didn’t let go of his hand as he led him the short distance to the amoebic circle. Dean’s other hand was shaking a little when he took hold of Charlie’s free hand.  
  
“I want each of us to say one thing that we’re thankful for,” Anna said, “I’ll go first.” She took a breath and closed her eyes. Charlie took the hint and closed her eyes too, so did Cas, Benny, and Garth. That just left Dean, looking at Cas with no one able to catch him doing it.  
  
Since they were holding hands, Dean was close enough to see Castiel’s lashes, individually hit his high cheekbones. Dean really hoped that Castiel would turn out to be his color match, even if it took a while; he just wanted to be able to look at him like this more often.  
  
Another inkling of color tinged into Dean’s vision.  
  
With that, Dean gave a silent huff and closed his eyes.  
  
“I am thankful for 5 years of colors and for my wonderful match. I’m thankful that it worked out this well and that we can all be friends and part of this club.”  
  
Charlie came next. “I am thankful for… ditto, just ditto.” She squeezed Dean’s hand.  
  
He panicked and just squeezed Cas’ hand immediately. He didn’t know what to say; what was he supposed to say? Cas squeezed back like he was telling him that he forgot to say something, but Dean just squeezed harder; he wasn’t ready yet.  
  
Sighing, Cas finally took the cue. “I am thankful for my sister, my family, my friends. I’m thankful that our school is so open and inviting.”  
  
Then Garth’s, “I’m thankful that Dean and Benny brought food. I’m looking forward to eating it.” There was a mixture of light groans and hushed laughing.  
  
“I’m thankful for good friends, good food, and good times.” Benny ended.  
  
At that point, both Charlie and Cas squeezed Dean’s hands. Dean cleared his throat. “Uh, I’m thankful for my family? I’m thankful for meeting all of you?” He though quickly. “I, uh, I’m thankful not to be alone for my senior year.”  
  
Everything was quiet for a moment. Dean was expecting something, either an ‘amen’ or a really loud sneeze; nothing came though. Everyone just let go of hands and Dean was forced to open his eyes. Everyone was wearing little smiles at each other and there was a permeating warm feeling pooling in the center of their group.  
  
Garth was the first to turn out of the circle. “Well, I’m starving.” He grabbed a grey-orange, paper plate and pulled open one chip bags. He loaded two handfuls onto his plate and popped one into his mouth. “Okay, unveil the food!”  
  
Unzipping the first casserole dish, Dean revealed his mac and cheese. Benny peeled back some aluminum foil from another dish to show off his baked ziti. Anna opened a store-bought veggie tray followed closely by fruit tray.  
  
“Did you make it from scratch?” Charlie’s pupils might as well have been hearts. Her fork was already in the mac and cheese. She took the forkful o her mouth instead of her plate and moaned, loudly. Anna swept in after her, putting a serving spoon into the mac and cheese.  
  
Dean nodded. “Yeah. My mom gave me the whole kitchen yesterday. I also made 7-layer dip.” He plucked at the saran wrap on the bowl.  
  
“Is this honey-bun casserole?” Cas’ voice filtered through the sounds of food and cheeriness. He was looking at Dean with anticipation with only half of the zipper undone on the casserole caddy.  
  
Trying not to blush, Dean tried not to swallow his tongue. “Uh-huh. I thought you’d enjoy it.”  
  
A full-blown grin stretched across Cas’ face. “Thank you, Dean.” He dug into the casserole loading his plate with it. He didn’t even get anything else before he went to take his seat on the couch.


	4. When We Grow Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The future is daunting. At the GCA meeting, the members talk about what they plan to do after school.

“Can we skip next week’s meeting?” Charlie groaned into the table where she’d practically melted. “I think I’ll need the time to study for my English exam. Who wants to help me read three of Shakespeare’s plays by next Thursday?” She turned a pleading look at Anna.  
  
Anna simply shook her head. “I’m already helping you study for History and I have my own classes, too. I can’t help you catch up on an entire semester of poor time-management.”  
  
“It wasn’t poor time-management. I managed to complete a video game or a multi-faceted, World of Warcraft quest every week. I’d say my time-management skills are top-notch.”  
  
Castiel shuffled his papers. “Yeah, it’s your prioritizing that needs improvement.”  
  
Honestly, Dean couldn’t be blamed for how loud he laughed at that. It was perfect timing and it was absolutely hilarious. Everyone else, those who weren’t laughing, just didn’t have the right kind of humor, okay?  
  
Glaring at him, Charlie stuck out her bottom lip like she was truly upset by Dean’s laugh.  
  
“What?” Dean shrugged. “He totally compared you to Hermione.” He peaked at her from the corner of his eye. “She needs to sort out her priorities.”  
  
Just as he’d hoped, her pout slid away and a little shimmer of awe replaced it. She grinned a little and returned to her normally happy self. She reached to the edge of her desk, wrapped her hands around the far side, shrugged, and settled into a contented posture.  
  
“I have my English exam on Thursday, too. I’d much prefer to have the extra time to study.” Garth added. His head was bent over his lap, but he darted his eyes around as if he expected people to be mad at him.  
  
Anna nodded slowly and turned to Cas. Cas just stared back.  
  
Making an over dramatic eyeroll, Anna huffed out an exasperated breath of air. “Look, Castiel, if you want to meet by yourself in this room, be my guest, but I think we’re gonna give some leeway next week.” She turned squinted eyes toward Charlie. “Some leeway,” she repeated at the younger red-head.  
  
Charlie seemed happy enough with that though; her face broke into a grin. “Thank you,” it was almost a sing-song. “I don’t even understand why I have to take English tests if I’m going to be a computer programmer or game designer. I mean, I know how to read and write; at this point, they’re just making me read old books and talk about my feelings with a bunch of strangers.”  
  
“You’ve had classes with these people all year, and probably last year and the year before that and before that…” As Benny trailed off, he leaned back in his chair and slid his butt forward on the seat. For a moment, Dean wondered if he was doing to slide straight to the floor; he didn’t.  
  
Reshuffling his papers and drawing the attention of the room back to him, Castiel leveled a look with Charlie. “Not exactly the case for Charlie. How many years have you skipped again?”  
  
Silence fell. Dean looked between the two. Castiel was calm and collected but Charlie’s cheeks were approaching a red that would match her hair color.  
  
Tired of waiting, Castiel continued, “4 years, right?”  
  
Charlie’s face got even redder, but she managed to nod.  
  
“Stop embarrassing her.” Anna threw a pink eraser at her brother. “How would you like if I advertised what year of school you’re supposed to be in?”  
  
Nothing against Charlie’s accomplishment – actually it was super impressive and Dean felt a little pang pity? Guilt? Sam would probably have skipped some grades if they hadn’t been moving around so much – but Dean was a lot more interested in the information about Castiel. He tried to nonchalantly direct all of his attention at Castiel.  
  
While Castiel hadn’t gotten red like Charlie had, he had gotten a lot stiller. Dean had learned to tell when Cas was embarrassed. He freezes up, he stops what he’s doing, or he stares into the distance. That Cas section of his brain was pinging in the background of his thoughts.  
  
Wait, was Cas younger than him?  
  
“Anna-”  
  
“Don’t ‘Anna’ me.” She crossed her arms over her chest and kicked one leg up to cross it over the other. “Go ahead and share with the class.”  
  
Cas’ papers were jittering in his hands. He really didn’t seem to want to talk about it.  
  
Clearing his throat, Dean leaned forward. “So, Charlie, you want to be a computer scientist? Where did you apply for college? Anywhere local?”  
  
The tension in the air didn’t immediately dissipate, but it was thinning, slowly.  
  
“I applied everywhere, but I worked especially hard on the applications for the local colleges and whatever ones that Anna applied to.” She sent a smile toward her color match.  
  
With that gesture, Anna’s stand-off with her brother eased and she uncrossed her legs; her arms sagged into her lap. “Yeah, I’m really hoping for this one med school in California. They have a brand-new lab-only building that looks like something out of… Which one was it?”  
  
“Star Trek,” Charlie supplied.  
  
“Yeah that.” Anna’s eyes glazed over a little while she talked about her top choice for school.  
  
Dean’s attention shifted though; it fell back onto Castiel. Since Dean had changed the topic, Cas’ shoulders had sagged back down to their normal level and he had carefully trained his gaze the desk in front of him. Not sure what to do, Dean reached over and put his hand on Cas’ thigh, giving a light squeeze.  
  
Jerking a little, Cas’ eyes flashed to the hand on his thigh before relaxing even further than before. He turned a grateful smile in Dean’s direction.  
  
Another smudge of color tinged Dean’s vision, but he couldn’t be frustrated in that moment. He was just happy that he could help Cas.  
  
Retracting his hand, Dean didn’t know where to put it. It was warm from Cas’ thigh and he kind of wanted to cherish the feeling. He ended up awkwardly resting his forearm to his own thigh, letting his warmed and tingling hand hang limp between his legs.  
  
By the time Dean tuned back into the conversation, Benny was talking.  
  
“Speak for yourself,” he waved a hand at Garth, “I want to be a cook, a chef; I don’t need any of this.” He gestured around in a vague move meant to signify the classroom or the school or something. “My food may look horrible for a while, but it will taste divine.”  
  
Garth crossed his arms over his chest. “Don’t worry, a lot of food looks ugly.”  
  
It was true. And worst part for Dean was that he couldn’t complain about it. But, some food looked absolutely nasty in color; his mom’s split pea soup looked like some sort of green-grey-brown slop. He’d always thought it was bright green, but no. At least burgers still looked good. And pie.  
  
Elbowing Cas in the side, Garth waggled an eyebrow. “So, what do you want to be?”  
  
“He’s gonna be a doctor like Anna.” Charlie provided with pride. “My family is brilliant!” She sent warm smiles to Anna and Castiel.  
  
A pang rang through Dean. Her family? Well, in a way, they were, and, in a significant way, they still weren’t. Charlie was basically a part of the Milton family. She and Anna would get married one day and make it official, but it was basically a done deal. She was Cas’ sister-in-law already.  
  
Did that mean she was Dean’s sister-in-law? He was Cas’ color match, right? Maybe?  
  
Dean realized that he really wouldn’t mind being family with Charlie or Anna. And, truth be told, he already considered himself Cas’ family, whether the feeling was mutual or not remained to be seen.  
  
It probably wasn’t.  
  
Sighing, Dean picked at a scratch on the edge of the wooden desk top. He’d thought himself into a bad mood. He hated when he did that.  
  
“Don’t you need colors to do anything in the Sciences? You have to take Chemistry and Biology and stuff and that requires colors.” Benny sounded like he regretted saying it while he was saying it.  
  
Castiel took a big, steadying breath and picked at his pants leg. “I’m hoping that my grades and academic standing with make me eligible for the Grey Scholarship Foundation for the Medical Sciences.”  
  
“What’s that?” Dean asked automatically; his brain was soaking in the information and cataloging it accordingly.  
  
“In short, it’s a huge scholarship. It’s for students who show a high aptitude for the sciences that don’t yet have their colors. Statistics show that most people find their color match by the time they’re 23 and only begin their collegiate education after that. The Sciences are hard subjects to take long breaks from. The scholarship covers the special materials, books, and ClearColor glasses for its recipients.”  
  
Everyone sat in silence for a long moment.  
  
“ClearColor glasses are really expensive.” Dean said. “I…” Dean couldn’t say it out loud. He wished he could fix them, him and Cas. He wished he could give his colors to Castiel. He wished that they had met and they’d both gotten colors at the same time. He wished that everything had gone to plan like in the romance novels that he swears he doesn’t take from his mother’s bookcase. “I hope you get it.” Suddenly, Dean felt tired, absolutely exhausted.  
  
The club bell rang letting all of the meeting clubs know that the late buses would be leaving in 15 minutes. Everyone stood from their seats.  
  
Garth and Benny waved their goodbyes and made their way to the door. They took the buses most days. Garth’s family had a car that he could use, but only with good reason. Benny usually just walked to his job when he needed to and didn’t want the hassle of a car.  
  
Charlie saluted at Dean, winking too. “See you later.” She grabbed Anna’s wrist and tugged her toward the door too.  
  
“Aren’t you going to help put the tables back?” Castiel called after them.  
  
Anna called back, somewhat apologetically. “Not today, sorry. I owe you one.” They were out the door already.  
  
“Must be having a date or something.” Dean shifted the desk he had occupied and moved on to the others in the circle. “They don’t usually skip out on the clean-up.” He offered Cas a smile, trying to apologize for Charlie’s behavior. They were family-ish after all.  
  
Staring after them, Castiel stood still. “I wish I understood what it was like.”  
  
“Hm?”  
  
“What it was like to have a color match? Does it feel different that just having friends or liking people?”  
  
Dean gave a vague shoulder shrug. In his experience, it felt like something special. It felt like he was Cas’ best friend and brother and confidant and side-kick. It felt like he was supposed to keep Cas safe but also that Cas was supposed to keep him safe in return. Did it feel like that for everyone?  
  
Head aching a little, Dean shifted Cas’ desk back into the usual formation. He stood next to Cas for a moment, looking out after where his sister and her color match had left them. He wanted to know what else was going through Cas’ head, but that was unlikely to happen.  
  
“Uh, Cas, could I ask you something?”  
  
Cas turned his eyes from the door. This close, Dean could see the blue in Cas’ eyes. It was grey-blue, but Dean wasn’t sure if that was because he couldn’t see just color or if that steely blue was the final color. Either way, Dean’s throat became dry and he couldn’t look away.  
  
His grey-pink lips moved. “I think you just did. But, you can ask me another.”  
  
Nodding a little, Dean tried to find his thoughts again. “What grade are you supposed to be in?”  
  
Cas tilted his head to the side and his features softened. “I thought you were going to ask me something worse.” He shook his head a little, like he was relieved, maybe? “I was held back a year. I had a tough time when my father left. Anna had Charlie to keep her stable; I…” he sighed.  
  
The room felt much smaller than a minute earlier; the space had previously been empty with six people, yet, at that moment, it felt too small for two.  
  
“You didn’t,” Dean supplied softly. He wasn’t sure where it came from, but he offered Cas an encouraging grin. “Color matches aren’t the only people you can share with. Your friends will support you too; I’ll support you, Cas.”  
  
“Thank you, Dean.”


	5. Feeling Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, Dean is exhausted from doing his exams and he may have just... accidentally... let slip that he could see colors.

Dean was almost asleep, that was how exhausted he was. He was already done with his college applications and all of that work, and trust, he was very happy with that fact. But since the high school faculty also knew that the college application process was over, they were laying on the work. He had three essays, two research papers, a group project and presentation, and an experiment report due in the next week and a half. On top of all that, it was high time for the Engineering and Robotics Team, which he had joined earlier in the year, and both clubs were getting ready for the Spring Fling.  
  
But then it would be the sweet bliss of spring break.  
  
He was counting the days, possibly the hours, until then.  
  
Correction, he was counting when he wasn’t half-asleep, like the way he was at that moment, slumped over a desk in the GCA’s club meeting room.  
  
He wasn’t entirely sure why they even had to participate in the Spring Fling. It seemed like a lost cause. The club would be disbanded if they didn’t win over at least 5 students to carry it forward. All of the current members were seniors and moving on to bigger and better things. Although, Sam already said that he’d like to join if they could keep it going.  
  
Dean hadn’t been very enthused at the news, but Castiel had politely thanked him for his willingness.  
  
The desperate state of the club, however, had kick-started their participation in the Spring Fling, a Friday event just before the start of Spring Break. Dean didn’t remember it at any other school he’d been to, and he’d been to quite a few. It was a day that the clubs could advertise to students from the middle schools. Buses would bring middle schoolers over to participate in games, demonstrations, and meetings.  
  
Having no idea of what to expect, Dean hadn’t been able to offer any helpful ideas or suggestions.  
  
In the end, they decided to make a tri-fold information board and give out bags of skittles at their table and signed up for a slot in each of the two formal presentations for the day.  
  
Charlie and Garth had come up with the worst and only idea for what they should do for the formal presentations, skits.  
  
So, in the end, Dean, Benny, and Charlie were trying to pick costumes for the club members’ characters from outfits each of them brought in while everyone else sought out study help because of all of the pre-spring-break assignments.  
  
Part of Dean wondered if he could have gone to the library and taken a nap in one of the comfy chairs while he waited for Cas to be ready to head home, but Castiel would ask him about the club meeting and Dean wouldn’t be able to lie to Cas so it would go downhill very quickly and he wasn’t prepared to deal with that… So, he was nodding off in the club room instead.  
  
“Dean!” Charlie must’ve been trying to get his attention for a while. “Which one for Anna?”  
  
He lolled his head in her direction to look at her and the options. She was frazzled; her red-gray hair was mostly fly-aways. He lolled back to his half-asleep position. “The blue one.”  
  
The tapping of Benny’s heel stopped and the room became deathly still.  
  
It took Dean a long moment with his absolute exhaustion to realize his mistake. His eyes flew open and he pushed up into a fully sitting position. Slowly, he turned around to see his friends, hopefully confidants?  
  
“You can see colors?” Charlie’s face was devoid of emotion.  
  
Benny’s was screwed up with confusion before it morphed into a grimace. “You can see colors?”  
  
“No?” It was worth the shot. Was it worth the shot?  
  
Charlie looked upset, like Dean had wounded her. Benny’s eyebrows twitched further together at the top of his nose.  
  
“Yes?” Dean tried again.  
  
No one did anything for a long moment. It was the clock ticking and Dean wasn’t even sure if anyone was breathing. The longer the silence went, the louder his heart seemed to pound. Could they hear it?  
  
Charlie fell back into the chair beneath her. Her hands dropped to the desk, the options she’d been holding up seemingly forgotten. “You can see colors. Have you been able to see colors the whole school year?” She was staring at the wood-grain top of the desk.  
  
Unsure of whether Charlie was speaking to herself or to him, Dean flicked his eyes to Benny only to be met with a stern look. “Fuck you, this is a safe space. That’s literally what the GCA is for. Why the- why the fuck did you keep that a secret?”  
  
Heart sinking, Dean knew this was it; he couldn’t go back from this. That comfy chair in the library seemed a lot more tempting now. “I, I uh…”  
  
“Do you not trust us?”  
  
“We are the people you would tell that to.”  
  
“I mean, I know you’re new, but I think we’ve been welcoming.”  
  
“We have been welcoming, Charlie. Don’t be hard on yourself.”  
  
“Yeah, well, don’t be hard on him!”  
  
“Guys!” Dean found his voice again. He really didn’t want to see these people arguing, especially over something as dumb as Dean being an idiot. “I have colors, but I also don’t have colors…?” He looked between the two of them.  
  
Charlie was watching with wide eyes, completely open and sympathetic. Benny made up for it, though, he looked like he was snarling, like if Dean got too close, he’d bite.  
  
They were waiting for him to explain and, honestly, Dean didn’t know how to do it. He wasn’t sure where to start. He wasn’t an expert on these things like Dr. Singer was. Oh, okay, he could start there.  
  
“So, uh, you remember the talk we went to last month at the University of Missouri? With Dr. Singer?” Dean curled his hands into fists on the desktop.  
  
They nodded, Benny’s harsher than Charlie’s.  
  
“Okay, remember when he went into the stuff on abnormal psycolorgy? How some colored matches don’t have it very lucky, that they may meet too early or too late, that it takes a long time for one’s colors to come in. All that? So, I have – or I think I have – Staged Color Progression. Dr. Singer went over it briefly. It’s when someone starts getting their colors, but it takes forever to have them come all the way in. So, I can see color, but I can still see grayscale.” He brought the heels of his hands to his eyes. He was so exhausted, he couldn’t tell if any of this made sense or not. “Ugh, I’m explaining this wrong.” Dean slumped over so his elbows were propped on the desk.  
  
Slowly, Benny’s foot began to tap again in the background. “So, you can see some colors, like blue but not red?”  
  
Dean didn’t look up when he responded, he still felt agonizingly guilty over all of this. “Not really? It’s like I can see grayscale with color at a really low opacity over it.” He debated briefly with himself before adding, “Every once in a while, the opacity gets darker, like I can see more of the color and less of the grayscale.”  
  
“So, you get a little more every time you see your soulmate? So, they have all their colors?” Charlie said it lightly, like if she spoke too strong or too seriously, she would break reality. Dean wasn’t sure if that was possible, but, at that moment, it felt as if it was.  
  
Peaking up, Dean was surprised to find Charlie was a little flushed. He realized in that moment just how much more color he had than the last time he’d been around blushing people. Wow.  
  
Also, he totally picked up on Charlie using ‘they’. Part of him was relieved, but another part of him was preoccupied on being worried about how much she knew, about how obvious he’d been.  
  
Benny had calmed down, too. He seemed like he was still processing, but he wasn’t fuming anymore and that was a step in the right direction. “She must be pretty, right?”  
  
Letting out a long exhale, Dean tried to figure out how to word the next part. He wasn’t really sure what their views on same-sex color matches were. Like, Charlie was probably pretty cool with it, since she was one half of a same-sex match, but Benny…? Well, Benny was cool with Charlie and Anna, obviously… but, also there are guys that are cool with girl-girl matches but squeamish about boy-boy because they’re male and that’s dumb but-  
  
“Oof,” Benny grunted and rubbed his side where Charlie had elbowed him.  
  
She pointed a glare in his direction and a little light seemed to flicker on behind his eyes. “Or, uh, he. I mean, he must be pretty, er… handsome? I just mean, whoever it is must look good. You know what I mean, right?”  
  
Dean could have kissed Charlie or, at least, her gaydar? “Well, uh, he, uh…” This was awkward even with their extra support. “His colors didn’t come in at all.” Dean’s eyes flicked around looking for something to focus on; he ended up staring at the discarded clothes on Charlie’s desk.  
  
A short silence fell again.  
  
“That’s sad.” Charlie’s voice had taken on an empathetic ring. “I wish there was something I could do. I couldn’t imagine if…” She trailed off, but Dean knew what she had been saying. She couldn’t imagine if it were her in his position, if Anna hadn’t gotten her colors when Charlie had.  
  
“So, you’re gay?” Benny’s voice was basically normal again.  
  
Dean huffed and turned playfully annoyed eyes on his friend. “I never really thought of it like that. I mean, most people are just looking for their soulmate, right? They’re soulmate-sexual?”  
  
“But, I mean, how long have you figured that it might be a guy?” Benny leaned forward on the desk, getting closer to Dean as if he was waiting to be told a secret.  
  
Thinking back, Dean couldn’t really come up with an exact moment. He shrugged, “My mother always jokes that when I comforted her after my dad died I promised her not to marry a man like him.” Belatedly, Dean realized that he hadn’t exactly explained that his father hadn’t just died but had died in a drunk-driving accident. Hopefully, they’d take the statement for what it was and let that other discussion alone for another time. He wasn’t sure how much more of these serious conversations he could take.  
  
Charlie snickered. “That’s adorable. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t laugh. It’s just… so fucking adorable.”  
  
In retaliation, Dean threw her the stink-eye, and, when he heard Benny’s snickers, he threw him the finger. And after a moment of choked off chuckles, they all burst out laughing.  
  
The pressure in the room evaporated and Dean felt like a weight had been lifted off his chest.  
  
“So, are you going to tell us who he is?” Charlie waggled her eyebrow. And just like that, the weight landed right back in Dean’s ribcage. His horror must have shown on his face because Charlie hands flew up and started waving back and forth. “Nevermind, nevermind. Another day, maybe?”  
  
“Maybe,” Dean agreed.  
  
“So,” Benny poked at the clothes on Charlie’s desk, “do you think we can decide the rest of the outfits before the late bus bell?” He looked over at the clock. “We have fifteen minutes.”  
  
Charlie shot up and gathered the clothes. “Anna will have my head if I don’t at least have this done. So, what? We decided on the blue on for her. Now, which of these for Castiel?” She threw the approved outfit in the approved pile and slid the other one back into the grocery bag it had originally come out of. She pulled out two other grocery bags showing off the clothes that Castiel had brought in as possible outfits for his character.  
  
Without hesitation, Dean immediately said, “The blue one.”


	6. Anna's Birthday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Anna's birthday and Mrs. Milton won't let color matches stay in the same room (nor will she let boys and girls share rooms), but it's okay since Charlie can stay over next door at Dean's.

“I have to thank your mother.”  
  
“Why?” Dean led the way up to his room. “You’ve already thanked her twice and Anna brought over ‘Thank You’ cookies yesterday.” He pivoted on the stair for a moment and pointed finger-guns at her. “Which are awesome, by the way.”  
  
Charlie beamed. “She’s a great baker.” She leaned forward and cupped a hand around a side of her mouth and whispered, “Just don’t ask her to cook.”  
  
Laughing, Dean hopped up the last few stairs and pushed open the door to his room. At this point, Charlie was like family. It was strange how easily she fit into his life. Of course, part of Dean wondered if that was due to the fact that they were sort-of destined kind-of to be in-laws, maybe?  
  
But that was something that Dean didn’t want to think about at the moment.  
  
Anna’s birthday was Sunday and her party was tomorrow, Saturday. Cas and Anna’s mother, Naomi Milton, was very strict about Charlie coming over. It was one of the reasons that they usually hung out elsewhere. Dean had only been to Cas’ house twice in the entire year.  
  
At first, he’d seen it as a bit of an insult; hell, he was Cas’ best friend. But, when he found out that Charlie was invited over about as often (and, at this point, rarely took up the offer), he felt a bit better.  
  
“So, you can either sleep on the trundle bed that we’d have to pull out of Sam’s room or you can take my bed and I’ll sleep in my brother’s room.” Dean pointed to the door across from his.  
  
Charlie dumped her stuff on Dean’s bed. “Whatever you want. It’s your house, not mine.” She looked around his room. “Well, maybe it’s your house. Why don’t you have more stuff in your room?”  
  
Shrugging, Dean sat on the edge of his bed. “We’ve never stayed anywhere long enough for me to accumulate anything.” He looked around; it felt cold and impersonal, but he kind of liked it that way. It was almost clinical. And, in a weird way, it reminded him of Cas and Cas’ room. One of the times he’d been at Cas’ house, he’d been given the grand tour, and, while the laundry room and the pantry were interesting in their own right, the highlights for Dean had been Cas’ room and the kitchen.  
  
When Dean’s eyes landed back on Charlie, she was wearing a smirk and had her fists pressed into her hips. “So,” she raised an eyebrow, “if I were to, oh I don’t’ know, go look in Sam’s room, it would be just as bare as this?”  
  
Dean rolled his eyes and flopped back onto the bed, defeated. “What do you want me to say? That I like it like this?” He threw his arms out, gesturing to his room in general.  
  
The bed dipped and Dean knew that Charlie had sat too. “I mean, if that’s the truth, then yeah.” Her voice was serious again. “I like the idea of you being truthful with me?”  
  
“Is that a question?”  
  
“No?”  
  
“Is that?”  
  
“Dean.” Charlie flopped back next to him, narrowly missing her bags on the way down. “I don’t know much about you. I mean, I met you less than a year ago, but it’s weird. It’s like, ugh, this is going to sound dumb, but, my colors have seemed more vibrant since you got here.”  
  
Dean’s brain was blank as he stared at the ceiling. He thought this would be more awkward. A girl, admittedly a very gay girl, who was Sam’s age, was laying on his bed with him, saying that he made her colors more vibrant. But, it was the most normal thing in the world. It was nice having someone to talk to about colors and color matches and same-sex color matches.  
  
“God. I sound crazy, don’t I?” She pressed a hand to her face.  
  
“Not really,” Dean shrugged into his comforter, “I mean, you know that my colors are coming in slowly and that every time I see someone they get brighter. Maybe that can happen after you find your match, too?”  
  
She flipped over onto her stomach and tucked her elbows under her head. “I didn’t really think of it like that.” She sighed. “I didn’t think there was any more color to get after I met Anna.”  
  
“Did you tell her?”  
  
Charlie’s eyes snapped wide open. “Of course, I did! I tell Anna everything.”  
  
Dean tensed. “Everything?”  
  
Sagging, Charlie’s eyes turned down to the comforter. She used a finger to trace one of the lines of stitches. “I didn’t tell her about your colors. That seemed too personal.” She flopped to her side. “Gosh, and it’s killing me. I haven’t kept a secret from Anna EVER! I feel so guilty.”  
  
And that made Dean feel guilty. It was bad enough that he was keeping a secret, but the fact that he was making other people keep his secret was taxing. “I’m sorry.” It was barely a whisper.  
  
“No, no. It’s okay, Dean. I mean, I’m your friend and I want to be there for you. When you decide to tell them, I’ll be there with you.” She patted his shoulder twice.  
  
He was never going to tell them, Anna or Cas or any of the Miltons. He’d decided that months ago, but now he had the growing guilt of Charlie’s confidence to contend with.  
  
Wait, was Charlie a Milton? Had he already broken his own resolve?  
  
At one of the talks the GCA went to, a lecturer, Dr. Crowley, had explained how some people can know each other as children and have no chemical attraction or color match, but, when they meet again later in life, sparks fly and their colors come in.  
  
Maybe that would happen to Cas. Maybe Dean just had to be patient.  
  
At the end of the lecture, Dean had asked the professor about Staged Color Progression, but Dr. Crowley hadn’t been very useful. He’d simply pointed him to the next lecturer in the series, Dr. Singer. But whatever. Dean had a working theory and he was going with it, whether it was scientifically plausible or not.  
  
He just really hoped it was.  
  
“So,” Charlie said awkwardly, “I brought a color game. Do you want to try playing?”  
  
Dean’s eyes darted to his door. “Yeah, definitely, just let me close the door.”  
  
They end up sitting cross-legged across from each other on the bed, each with a fan of cards. Since Dean could see the grayscale and the colors, he could tell why people without their colors couldn’t play. All of the cards were the exact same gray; the hues were different colors, but the gray was the same.  
  
These were games that people would play with other married, color-match couples or as children, after or before they saw in grayscale. Dean remembered, vaguely, that he had played these games with his mother when he was little. He hadn’t had a chance to play them with Sam since he’d lost his colors before Sam had been old enough to play.  
  
Come to think of it, his mom and Sam hadn’t played the games when Sam had been old enough to play them. At least, Dean couldn’t think of any time they’d played. Maybe it reminded his mom of when his father was alive.  
  
“Your turn.” Charlie sing-songed through Dean’s thoughts. She was winning, so she was in a fantastic mood.  
  
Laughing, Dean shook his head and stared at the last discard. He sighed a little. “Is that green closer to blue or yellow?” He tried to really concentrate on the card. If he’d been paying attention, he’d know whether blue or yellow was more recently played and then obviously know which end of the green-spectrum it was on. There was a logic to it, blue, blue-green, yellow-green, then yellow and so on.  
  
No wonder Charlie was winning.  
  
“It’s blue-green.” Her happy expression didn’t change, but the chime in her voice did. She sounded like she was pitying him, just a little. “So, you still can’t see that much color, huh?”  
  
He shrugged. “I can see enough. I can tell that it’s green, but the gray behind it makes it hard to tell if it leans toward blue or yellow. I have the same problem with purple and orange.”  
  
“So, you can see primary and secondary colors but not tertiary or anything else.”  
  
Dean placed a blue card down on the pile. “Yeah, basically.”  
  
She quickly placed a purple card, logically a blue-purple, and then waited for Dean again. Dean stared into his hand. He had three purple cards, but he didn’t know if they were blue-purple or red-purple. He pulled one out and showed it to Charlie with a raised eyebrow. She shook her head. So, that one must have been blue-purple since he couldn’t play it. He put it close to his green cards in his hand to remind himself.  
  
For Dean, it was turning into a memory game as well.  
  


He tried comparing that card with the other two purple cards, but he couldn’t see enough of a different to make a guess. Sighing, he picked up the next one. When Charlie nodded at him, he grinned and put it down. That card must have been red-purple.  
  
Charlie quickly laid another purple card, logically blue-purple.  
  
Busy glaring at the last unclassified purple card in his hand, Dean jumped when his door burst open.  
  
“Charlie! There you are! Can I ask you a question about color matches?” Sam stood in the doorway, holding a book to his chest; a finger was tucked between two of its pages, probably marking where his question came from.  
  
Dean growled, “Knock, bitch,” but his brain was jump-started into trying to hide the cards. Since Sam had startled them both, the discard and draw piles were a mess on the bed and Charlie had dropped her cards in surprise. Dean tried to gather up the cards.  
  
Jumping up from the bed and walking toward Sam, Charlie grinned. “Of course, Sam.” She tried to sequester him to the door. “What’s your question?”  
  
The two of them got along really well, too, and, for that, Dean was very grateful. In previous places, Dean had made friends that Sam had hated and Sam had made friends that Dean had hated. Ruby. God, Dean hated Ruby.  
  
It seemed to help that Sam and Charlie were the same age and both too smart for their own good.  
  
Sam’s squinted eyes remained trained on Dean for a long second before he turned his attention to the book in his hand. Opening it, he pointed to a line and began to speak animatedly with Charlie.  
  
Taking a deep breath, Dean deflated having collected the slightly worn color game card into a full deck in his hands. At least Sam hadn’t seen them.  
  
\---  
  
Even though it hadn’t been one of the options that Dean had provided, Charlie slept on the trundle in Sam’s room. They’d gotten into a philosophical discussion about soul matches and, eventually, Dean had taken Charlie stuff and dropped it just inside Sam’s door with a short, “I’m going to sleep. I suggest you think about it, too.”  
  
So, yeah, he’d been jealous that Sam had stolen his friend for the night but not as jealous as he thought he’d be. Charlie wasn’t just Dean’s; it felt like she was family, like how he could be mad at Sam for ‘stealing’ mom’s attention but still know that she loved them both.  
  
Morning came quickly and Dean found himself fighting with the coffeemaker a bit more than usual.  
  
“Can I talk to you?” It was Sam’s voice coming across the room from the kitchen door.  
  
Dean ground his teeth together, more from frustration with the coffeemaker than his brother. “You already are,” he bit it out, but he couldn’t be blamed for that since he hadn’t had his morning coffee yet.  
  
Crossing the room, Sam leaned heavily against the countertop next to Dean and the demonic machine he was fighting with. “Have you… do you know…?” He let his head fall back and look at the ceiling. Taking a puff of breath, he turned and caught Dean’s eye, “Do you have your colors?”  
  
So, he had noticed.  
  
Giving up on the coffeemaker, Dean turned and pulled the almond milk from the fridge, pouring that into his mug instead of his usual morning beverage. He took a swig and put it down. “It’s complicated.”  
  
Dean had expected Sam to go nuts. He had expected questions upon questions, screeching and yelling. He’d expected the sort of noises that came from his brother when people got their colors in his favorite movies and television shows.  
  
That wasn’t what happened, though. What happened shocked him even more.  
  
“It’s Cas, right?”  
  
The almond milk almost got spewed across the room. Dean choked a little, “What?”  
  
Sam smirked. “That was just as telling as an actual answer.” He took the carton of almond milk and poured himself a glass. “Why haven’t you said anything? I mean, I really like Cas. He’s calm and considerate and really smart and-”  
  
“Sam, he didn’t get his colors.”  
  
Silence.  
  
“What do you mean?” Sam put his cup back on the counter.  
  
“I mean, it’s complicated. I don’t even have all of my colors. And…” Dean pointed a finger at his brother’s open mouth, knowing he was about to demand more answers, “I really can’t have this conversation right now. I have to deal with Charlie and Anna and Cas all day today. I promise, we can have this conversation tomorrow, deal?” He turned his determined expression into a pleading one.  
  
Sam nodded. “I guess.” The doorbell rang, and, without missing a beat, Sam raised an eyebrow, “And that’ll be Cas now.”  
  
Rolling his eyes, Dean went to open the door. He tried to smother the blush that was creeping up his neck and toward his cheeks. Stupid Sam.  
  
A peek through the peephole confirmed his brother’s suspicion and Dean took a deep breath, steadying himself, before opening the door. “Hey, Cas.”  
  
“Hello, Dean. Is Charlie up?”  
  
Dean was going to answer ‘no’, but thumping noises rang out from the direction of Sam’s room and then down the stairs. He turned to see Charlie standing half-way down the stairs with bed-head and rumpled sleep clothes.  
  
She rubbed at her eye. “I’m up.” She yawned, big and comically. “Totally up.”  
  
Cas chuckled and his lips quirked up at one end. “I can tell, and completely ready to help my sister who’s been freaking out for the last three hours about making sure the house is clean enough for guests.”  
  
Shoulders jerking and her expression scrunching up, Charlie licked her bottom lip. “Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be ready.” With that, she turned and bounded back up the stairs.  
  
Smiling, Dean couldn’t believe how normal, how domestic, it all felt. It was so natural and a fun kind of mundane. He turned to Cas.  
  
Sam stepped out of the kitchen and smiled generously. “Hi, Cas.” He crossed the room, holding out a cup of almond milk. “I know you prefer Cashew, but this is usually what you drink when you’re at our house.”  
  
Taking the glass, Cas nodded. “Thank you. I don’t usually have the opportunity to drink milk outside of my house. When I can, I try to make the most of it.” He took a sip.  
  
“Cas, I have a question.”  
  
Suddenly, Dean felt his insides freeze. This was it. Sam was going to out him. Sam was going to make some comment or some really specific question and Cas would figure it out. Cas was so smart. In fact, all of these people were smart. How did Dean end up in the midst of all these geniuses?  
  
“What is it?”  
  
Dean felt like he was melting. He was a puddle, now.  
  
“How do you feel about Charlie?”  
  
Cas looked at Sam head-on. They were almost the same height, which said a lot more about Sam’s height than Cas’. Cas was about Dean’s height which was taller than most of the seniors; Sam was just freakishly tall and destined to be a giant. “She’s nice and kind. She’s great for Anna. She’s probably the reason why Anna didn’t fail when our father left; the rest of us did. Charlie stepped up, became Anna’s stability. I’m happy for them.”  
  
So Cas and Gabe must have both flunked.  
  
Sam waved a hand around the air. “That’s great Cas, really, but, I wanted to know how you felt about Charlie. What is she to you? Did you know she was going to be your sister-in-law when you met her?”  
  
Eyes widened in surprise but face still classically stoic, Cas thought about it for a moment. “I didn’t explicitly know. It wasn’t some voice in the back of my head telling me that she was going to marry my sister, but...” He donned a small smile. “I knew she was important, that she was someone that would be around for a long time.” He turned to Dean, “You saw how I was when you first met me; I’m not very approachable and I don’t make friends easily. I never have.”  
  
Dean was still staring at Cas and Cas was still staring at Dean when Sam spoke up. “So, it was easy to become her friend. Like it felt natural?”  
  
Like a sigh, Cas nodded, still looking at Dean. “Natural sums it up pretty well.” He pulled his eyes away to look at Sam.  
  
The blush that Dean had caught in his neck earlier forced through the roadblock and crawled onto his face.  
  
Luckily, Cas was paying attention to Sam instead of Dean. “She felt like extended family right from the start.”


	7. Castiel's Point-of-View

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I think the chapter title says enough about this chapter. *shrugs*

He’d just graduated. Cas stared at his cap and gown, now retired, where they hung a white hanger hooked on the back of his door. This was crazy. He was done with high school, admittedly a year later than normal, but still.  
  
Excited. That’s what he felt. He was excited to be done, to be moving on to other things, bigger things.  
  
He spun on his heel, following the light feeling in his chest to his window.  
  
The grey sky was bright and the grey grass was twitching in the beginnings of a summer breeze.  
  
But it was still grey.  
  
“Well, that didn’t last long,” he mumbled, slouching against one side of his window seat. He pulled a foot up onto the seat cushion and wrapped his arms around the bent knee. Plopping his cheek onto the knee, he watched Dean’s house out the window.  
  
It was weird and amazing to be this close to finding your color match, but he wasn’t sure what he had to do.  
  
When he’d met Dean, he’d known it was something special. He’d known that Dean was going to be a big part of his life for a long time just like he’d known when he met Charlie. And, honestly, he’d been extremely excited.  
  
And Cas had made it his mission to get close to Dean, to meet everyone associated with Dean.  
  
For a while, Cas thought that his color match was going to be Dean’s brother, Sam. It made sense. Dean always spoke about how Cas reminded him of Sam or that they’d make great friends. But, when Cas finally met Sam, no colors bled into his vision. It wasn’t special, not in the least.  
  
Okay, that might be a bit of a lie. Sam had that same feeling about him that Dean did, that ‘this person is going to be in your life for a long time and you might as well make friends with them now’ feeling that Charlie had come with.  
  
And now…  
  
Now, Cas was just confused. Dean had already said that he didn’t have any other family, at least not that he knew of, and that left Castiel really confused.  
  
And if that weren’t bad enough, Cas felt bad sometimes. It was like he was using Dean to try and find his color match. But that wasn’t it anymore! Promise!  
  
It had started out that way, but at this point, Dean was his best friend. The best friend he’d ever had, closer than even Anna at times. Which made this so hard because he really needed to talk to someone about this, and he didn’t want to pester Anna with his overgrown moping.  
  
There was a knock on the door, and, of course, it was Anna. “Hey, Castiel, Charlie texted me that she’s on her way over. You want to text Dean that we’re about ready to go for celebratory milkshakes?” She grinned.  
  
Frozen in place, Castiel just stared. Was this a sign that he should talk to her about it? Color matches were proof of some sort of fate, right? Maybe this was part of that fate.  
  
She quirked her head to the side. “What’s wrong?” She crossed the room and perched on the other side of the window seat. It was cramped; they hadn’t both sat on it since they were little, well, since before Charlie had come into their lives.  
  
Castiel looked out the window to gather his thoughts.  
  
“Is it about Dean?”  
  
Jerking his head back around, Castiel almost connected his nose and his knee. To avoid other close calls, he dropped his leg down to the cushion. “What do you mean? About Dean?” He was weary of where this would go. He hadn’t broached this subject with Anna before, not completely; he’d skimmed around it when he’d told Anna that he wasn’t going with her and Charlie to college.  
  
That had been one hell of a conversation; perhaps, argument was a better term for it. Cas had received the scholarship from the Grey Foundation for the Medical Sciences, but by then, he had decided to stay near Dean. He’d tried to gloss over that by making it about letting Anna and Charlie have space and by saying that he was tired of third-wheeling. He’d made sure never to name Dean. It was weird, but Dean was the first real friend he’d made since their father left. The only person he trusted outside of Anna and Charlie. He didn’t want to lose him, and putting entire states between them seemed to be counterintuitive, especially since Dean hated flying.  
  
But now that Anna had brought this – whatever it is – up, Cas had to know. If it was something about Dean, he needed to know it. He needed to defend Dean if it was bad; he needed to congratulate Dean if it was good. He needed…  
  
He needed to know what was happening. All of the lectures and professors and psycolorgists that they’d been to in the last year (and a few that Cas had taken the liberty to email questions to) hadn’t been able to provide any answers.  
  
“Oh, I thought Charlie told you?” Anna said it light and airy; the way she usually spoke about Charlie.  
  
And in that instance, it rubbed Castiel the exact wrong way. “Why would she tell me anything!? She’s your color match,” he jabbed a finger at his sister to emphasize his point, “Your girlfriend,” jab, “Your best friend.” He pulled his hand back and crossed it over the other on his chest. “You two keep secrets from me all the time.”  
  
Anna had jerked back. She was pressed against the opposite wall of the window seat with an expression somewhere between shock and horror and pity pinching at her face. “We don’t mean to.”  
  
Deflating, Cas tossed his head back against the wall, staring at the ceiling. “I know you don’t mean to.” He followed a hairline crack in the ceiling with his eyes. “It’s just that you were my friend and Charlie took you away and now she’s taking Dean away and I don’t like it.”  
  
“Are you mad at Charlie?!” Anna’s temper flared up, just like it did whenever someone said anything bad about Charlie. Luckily, Cas had expected it and waited until she got passed it on her own. Anna took a breath, “Sorry. You’re frustrated with Charlie, with the situation really.”  
  
Cas shrugged and lolled his head back to the window. Down below, Charlie had arrived on her bike. She parked it out front of their house, out of Cas’ view from his window, before skipping over to Dean’s house to collect him.  
  
Charlie was very gay and Cas shouldn’t be jealous, especially since Dean wasn’t his color match. He was just his best friend.  
  
One day, Dean would meet his color match and leave him, just like Anna.  
  
“No, he won’t.”  
  
He jerked at the voiced response to his thoughts; he must’ve been thinking aloud.  
  
Anna reached a hand across and laid it on Cas’ arm. “He really cares about you, about all of us.” She scoffed a little. “Do you really think he would have been in that horrible skit if he didn’t?”  
  
Thinking back to the spring fling, Cas couldn’t help but chuckle. They had re-enacted some famous color matches and explained some of the lectures they’d been to. Dean had been paired with Garth in the skit, and Garth had a way of going over the top. There may have been a sock puppet involved, and yet Dean had powered through the rehearsals and performances without batting an eye.  
  
Anna smiled, probably thinking about the same sort of things. “I can’t believe we got 8 people to join! Our club didn’t die.” It was her turn to look out the window glassy-eyed.  
  
Sighing, Cas couldn’t tell her, but those 8 people were probably more a product of either their table or Sam’s persuasion. Cas never wanted to be on the receiving end of Sam’s cunning; he almost signed himself up again. The kid would make an excellent lawyer if he continued on that route.  
  
“What’s it feel like when you’re around Charlie?” She was still looking outside.  
  
Cas followed Anna’s gaze down to where Charlie was leading Dean over to their house. She was explaining something, probably about planes or robotics from their other club. Her arms were moving furiously around the air. Dean said something and she turned and started to explain with more vigor, stopping them in the grass between their houses.  
  
Turning his gaze to his sister, Cas cataloged the softness in her features, the way a small smile had crept onto her face, her relaxed eyebrows. Letting out a breath he’d been holding, Cas knew this was it. This was when his ramshackle lie would fall apart. “Like that,” he said simply.  
  
Eyes flicking to him, Anna gave a curt nod. “So, do you think he’s Gabriel’s color match?”  
  
“WHAT?!” Everything in Cas clenched and not in a good way. He felt sick. “Why would-?”  
  
Lifting a hand in a nonchalant gesture, Anna relaxed back against the wall and closed her eyes, completely oblivious to Cas’ pain. “I mean, he’s not your color match, so that leaves Gabe.”  
  
Cas pressed a hand to his stomach. He was going to throw up. He was literally going to throw up. He jumped up and ran to the bathroom. Absently, he could hear Anna running after him, but he didn’t actively think about it until he was retching into the toilet.  
  
Patting his shoulder, Anna kept apologizing.  
  
Once Cas was done, he slumped into a kneeling position in front of the toilet, absolutely exhausted. He closed his eyes and tried to get his breathing back. He wiped at his forehead where he’d broken a sweat and took the warm washcloth that Anna offered, continuing to clean his face and mouth.  
  
She flushed the toilet for him.  
  
With the adrenaline fading, Castiel realized just how messed up all of this was, how telling his reaction was.  
  
Anna sat on the edge of the tub. “So, do you like him?” Her voice was wary like she wasn’t sure if the words would set him off again.  
  
“I don’t know, Anna.” Cas rubbed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I don’t think so. He’s my best friend; I just don’t want to lose him.” Anger bubbled up inside of Castiel’s chest. “Especially not to Gabe.” Cas turned to the floor, muttering, “Fuck, Gabe.”  
  
When he turned back to Anna, she had her elbow on her knee and her head in her hand, looking at him with an unreadable expression, the sort of look she’d use when she was doing an experiment in their AP Biology class.  
  
He wasn’t some science experiment. He turned away and let the silence eat at the walls.  
  
Anna looked up when footfalls sounded from the stairs. The steps got closer, pausing twice – probably at each of their rooms – on the way to the bathroom.  
  
A gasp sounded from the doorway. “Cas! Are you pregnant?”  
  
Turning slowly, Cas knew his face was pinched into something irritated and confused. When he saw Charlie, there was an exaggeratedly shocked expression, her hands on each cheek and her mouth open; he threw her the finger.  
  
His gaze shifted to Dean who was standing over Charlie’s shoulder with a more believable look of concern. “Are you okay?”  
  
“I just threw up. I’m not dying,” Castiel deadpanned in his usual way of deflecting emotions; he didn’t want to have to give the whole explanation to Dean. Instead, he shifted his attention, watching as Charlie and his sister had a silent conversation over his head.  
  
Anna turned a wobbly smile toward Cas, “So, I think we’re going to skip milkshakes today.”  
  
Shaking his head, Cas began to stand up. He didn’t get far. He closed the toilet seat lid and sat there. “You guys can still go. I’ll go another time.” He turned to see what he already knew was there, Charlie’s grateful expression.  
  
She winked and pointed at him. “You’re the best, Cas! Come on, Anna.” And with Charlie dragging Anna by the elbow, they exited the bathroom and left down the stairs.  
  
“You’re going to miss the celebratory milkshakes,” Cas said to the wall, not wanting to look at Dean.  
  
Dean leaned against the bathroom counter, Cas could tell by the creaking noise that followed. Dean huffed, “We can go another day. Besides, there’s no room on the bike for me.” He chuckled at his own joke, probably an attempt to lighten the mood.  
  
Stubborn and holding onto the bad mood he’d surrounded himself in, Castiel turned to Dean. “I’m sorry for getting sick on graduation day.”  
  
Dean looked good standing there, like he belonged. Cas wasn’t sure what he’d do when Dean found his color match. It wasn’t something he wanted to think about, especially with what Anna had pointed out. He just wanted to keep his best friend. His best friend that felt like family, who might even be Gabe’s color match.  
  
Thinking about it, Cas realized that it might be possible. Dean and Gabe had the same sort of humor and both liked sweets. Dean and Gabe both had an affinity for old cars and practical jokes. Dean and Gabe hadn’t met yet. Maybe, when Gabe came back after his trip with his friends, he and Dean would look at each other and get their colors and leave him behind, leave him grey and alone.  
  
No matter how much Cas hated to admit it, Gabe wasn’t a bad person. Maybe he could be happy with Dean as a brother-in-law. At least, Dean couldn’t completely leave him. They’d be family, real family.  
  
Dean held out a hand to Cas, offering to help him up. “How about we go downstairs and watch all of the new Star Trek movies back-to-back?”  
  
Taking the proffered hand, Cas nodded. Yeah, maybe he could get used to brother-in-law Dean.


	8. The Mandatory Beach Episode

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, every good anime has that mandatory beach episode, right?

Dean was impressed how well Sam got along with everyone. Upon second thought, he realized that it shouldn’t have been a surprise. Sam was smart and mature for his age, much like Charlie, and he had an interest in color matches, which was the whole reason the rest of them hung out together.  
  
Through an infuriating group message, the GCA had managed to put together a beach day. They had packed sandwiches for lunch and brought packets of hotdogs and hotdog buns for dinner.  
  
Walking back up the beach after getting tagged in a weird game that Anna and Cas had made up when they were little - something between tag and dodgeball in the water - Dean joined Garth under the umbrella that Benny had gotten for discount from his boss.  
  
Garth looked scrawny in his t-shirt and jeans, but, somehow, he managed to look scrawnier in swim trunks and huge sunglasses. He was reclined into a makeshift lounger dug into the sand and covered with the towels.  
  
“Enjoying your nap?” Dean deposited himself into the other side of the towel-covered ditch. It was comfier than it looked.  
  
Garth lazily turned his head. “I’m not asleep. I’m just contemplating.”  
  
One of Dean’s eyebrows rose, he could feel the tell-tale tightness from being in the sun too long. “Contemplating what?” He reached for the sunscreen near Anna’s bag and began to reapply, wondering if he should remind the others.  
  
“The finer things.” Garth grabbed a water from the cooler and twisted it open.  
  
“So, that didn’t actually tell me anything about what you were thinking about.”  
  
“Color matches.” Garth recapped the bottle and placed it next to him. “I was thinking about color matches.”  
  
Dean hadn’t thought much about Garth and his colors and color match situation. Garth always seemed so happy and optimistic that Dean never considered that he was unhappy. “Anything in particular?”  
  
Shrugging, Garth pulled his sunglasses from his head. “Just, what if I never find her? I mean, what if I walk right by her?”  
  
“That won’t happen. She’ll get her colors and chase after you.” Dean held the sunscreen bottle out to him. “Could you get my back?”  
  
Garth nodded and took the bottle, somewhat absentminded. “But what if I get away? Maybe we pass each other and I’m getting on a plane or onto a train, and she doesn’t get to me in time?” He smoothed some sunscreen onto Dean’s back.  
  
Wincing at the temperature of the cream, Dean tried not to think of earlier when Cas had helped him do this. He’d probably been really red and breathing weird. It had felt intimate. Despite him and Garth doing the exact same thing only a little while later, it wasn’t the same. It was intimate but solely platonic.  
  
Dean recovered his voice, “That’s oddly specific. I wouldn’t worry too much about it. Soulmates are something cosmic; I’m sure it’ll work out.”  
  
Garth’s hands disappeared from his back.  
  
Turning around, Dean saw Garth looking for something to wipe his hands on. He managed to grab a sandless towel from the stack and toss it into Garth’s lap before he wiped the sunscreen off onto his swim trunks.  
  
Wiping his hands, Garth threw an unsure smile in Dean’s direction. “Castiel said about the same thing. I’m sure you guys are right.”  
  
A brand-new flush threatened to spread across Dean’s face and upper torso. If anyone asked, he’d blame the sun. Dean busied himself with drawing lines in the sand with a stick.  
  
“How’s that going, by the way?”  
  
“How’s what going?”  
  
“You and Cas and your colors?”  
  
Dean almost broke the stick. He whipped his head around to see if anyone was close enough to have heard what Garth said. When no one was, he turned to Garth. “How do you know about that?”  
  
Holding his hands up in mock-surrender, Garth hastened to reply, “Benny told me. He didn’t mean to tell me, but he thought I was Charlie and mentioned something. I’ve been sworn to secrecy, lips locked, key forgotten, and all that.”  
  
Grinding his teeth, Dean flashed a glare at Benny.  
  
Benny was still playing the water-dodgeball-tag game, but froze and stared back at Dean when he noticed. He seemed to figured out what had happened and offered a sheepish smile and a shrug.  
  
“It really was an accident. It’s just the four of us that know, Benny, Charlie, me, and you.”  
  
“And Sam,” Dean added, annoyed with the turn of events. Basically, everyone knew. Why can’t people keep secrets?  
  
Garth pointed around at people, counting them off silently. “So, everyone but the Miltons know?”  
  
Dean pulled his knees to his chest and buried his face there. “Unless you count Charlie as a Milton.”  
  
“True.”  
  
They lapsed into silence. The sound of the others splashing around in the water seemed deafening despite the absence of walls.  
  
“At least you know who your soulmate is supposed to be.” Garth’s voice was tiny and almost lost behind the noises of the game.  
  
Dean lifted his head. “At least you have all your colors.”  
  
They nodded at each other in comisery. After the moment passed, Dean lifted his chin to his knees and looked out at the others.  
  
Charlie was soaked from head to toe; her hair plastered to his neck and shoulders. In contrast, Anna was unscathed, practically dry from the waist up. Dean was trying to figure out how she’d managed that until Sam threw the ball making a huge splash in their direction. Charlie jumped in front of Anna, taking the brunt of the spray.  
  
The next person to get a hold of the ball was Benny, and, when he did, he sent it hurtling at Sam who had to dive into the water to get away. Unfortunately, Sam got tagged with the ball, so he was officially out. When Sam surfaced, he and Charlie began to argue over whether he was really out or not. Oh well.  
  
Dean’s gaze panned over to Cas. He wasn’t even paying attention to the others or the game. He was looking in Dean’s general direction, eyes further away than they should be.  
  
Shifting into Cas’ line of sight, Dean offered a short wave.  
  
Cas jerked and turned away, probably embarrassed from zoning out.  
  
One day, Castiel would fly back from college take one look at him and get his colors. Hopefully. Dean still hadn’t found any scientific evidence to support that, so it was just an educated guess.  
  
Dean leaned back, unfolding his knees and bracing himself on his hands. He crossed his fingers. Hopefully, one day Cas would be his. All his. And honestly, Dean had never really thought of himself as a selfish guy. He was pretty good at sharing his things, but Cas seemed to be different. It was like Dean wanted to keep him in his pocket wherever he went, wanted Castiel to bottle up everything he did when Dean wasn’t around and gift it to him when he saw him again, just to make sure that Dean didn’t miss anything that was inherently Cas-like. He wanted him all to himself. Cas with his tan body and broad shoulders, with his strange, paisley-print trunks, with his bright blue eyes, with his gummy smile, with his- Shit. He was coming this way.  
  
“Anything interesting going on up here?” Cas unfolded another towel and sat outside the umbrella’s shade on the other side of Dean.  
  
Garth groaned from where he’d relaxed into his sand-lounge. “Just a pleasant nap that you’ve interrupted.” He huffed and grew still again, apparently intent on resuming.  
  
Dean sat back up, sitting up and turning to Cas. “Did you lose the game?”  
  
Blushing a little, Cas stared down at where he began to draw designs in the sand with his index finger. “No.” He flicked his eyes back to Dean. He seemed a little embarrassed, maybe?  
  
“What is it?” Dean leaned forward into Cas’ space. “What don’t you want to tell me?” He had donned a playful smirk, knowing that Cas would just ignore him and not tell him if he really didn’t want to.  
  
Cas rolled his eyes and pointed a look back out where the others were playing in the water, well, arguing really. “Your brother is very competitive.” He turned back to Dean.  
  
Shrugging, Dean ignored Cas’ gaze and watched as his brother flung the ball at Benny. “We moved around a lot. You either had to get competitive or you had to become passive. It’s just the way he went.” Dean pushed up to his knees. “I’ll go calm him down, remind him it’s just a game.” He went to get up but was stopped by a hand on his wrist.  
  
When Dean turned back, Castiel had a deep red scorching the tips of his ears and his eyes trained out on the water. “Don’t.”  
  
Dean sagged back down so he was sitting on his towel again. He didn’t pry his wrist from Cas’ grip, instead placing it near enough to Cas that he wouldn’t have to let go. Dean really didn’t want him to let go. He just kept staring at wear they were touching.  
  
“It’s nice to see Charlie act her age.” Cas was wearing a soft smile.  
  
They lapsed into silence. Dean wondered if Garth had actually fallen asleep, but, when Dean glanced in his direction, he was met with a lewd smirk and a waggling eyebrow above his shades. Dean jerked back to looking at the waves, suddenly fighting a monumental flush.  
  
The game broke up after Sam and Charlie got into another argument. It wasn’t a bad argument, just that they were both too competitive for their own good. Honestly, Dean should have seen it coming.  
  
With the game over, Benny trudged back up toward them. “It should be about time for us to reapply sunscreen.” He pulled out his spray can and gently kicked Garth’s side asking for his help. “Spray me.”  
  
Garth begrudgingly got up to help Benny and Anna stole his spot in the trench under the umbrella. As if she were trained, Charlie came and sat directly in front of her, baring her back to get lathered with sunscreen. Charlie’s fair skin needed more protection than the spray sunscreens offered, so Anna had to apply the SPF 150 by hand. Charlie didn’t seem to mind.  
  
Dean tended to have the same problem with sunscreen as Charlie; he wasn’t a red-head, but he had a fairer complexion that bred freckles and sun damage.  
  
“I can help you, again?” Cas snatched the SPF 150 bottle from around Dean’s back, his skin brushing against Dean’s and causing all kinds of reactions in Dean’s body, mainly butterflies.  
  
Fully intent on telling Cas that he’d already reapplied, Dean spun around to his friend. But instead of explaining the situation, Dean found himself in a new one, nose-to-nose with Cas. Dean held his breath. What was he supposed to do? Why did this happen to him?  
  
Cas turned away first, thank God.  
  
Suddenly Dean could breathe again, air rushing into his lungs. He tried to control his breathing so he didn’t look so obviously affected.  
  
Hearing the tell-tale sound of sunscreen being squeezed into a hand, Dean simply ran with it. What could too much sunscreen do? He turned a little so that Cas could reach his back, sure that his face was bright red.  
  


Luckily, Anna was too busy attending to Charlie to notice Dean’s blush or Benny’s wink or Garth’s thumbs-up. Seriously, could they tone it down?  
  
Staring at the ground, Dean tried not to think about the hands on his back, but they were really nice. Big and smooth and honestly, Dean felt like sand, falling away with every movement of those fingers. Dean felt his ears heat up when Cas’ hands trailed up to his neck. Cas’ hadn’t done that last time; Dean had applied sunscreen to his own neck.  
  
Oh, but it felt good. Dean bit his lip and closed his eyes. What was he? A 14-year-old girl in a soap opera?  
  
Benny finished spraying Sam, which was nice of him because Dean was obviously indisposed.  
  
“You need to do your front, Dean.” Cas poked at Dean’s arm before going back to his task.  
  
Letting out a breathy laugh and hoping it didn’t sound too out-of-place, Dean shrugged a little and stirred up some bravado in his chest, using it to disguise his flustered state. “Figured I’d wait until either you or Anna was done. Didn’t need to have three people fighting over the bottle.”  
  
Anna was taking her time on Charlie. She was moving her hands in smooth, confident strokes. She turned and offered Dean a small grin. “It’s okay. Go ahead and get some; I’m on the last bit anyway.” Charlie made a small noise in her throat as some sort of protest.  
  
“We’re gonna start up the barbecue for dinner. Sound good?” Garth hooked his thumbs over his shoulders toward one of the public barbecues.  
  
There was a murmur of agreement.  
  
Shooting his hand up in the air, Sam exclaimed, “I want to help,” which brought on a few snickers, too.  
  
Garth grinned. “Okay. Let’s get going.”  
  
Groaning, Benny uncrossed his arms from over his chest. Resigned, he mumbled, “I’m gonna go supervise. Y’all good here?”  
  
“Yes.” Cas’ curt answer was a bit closer to Dean’s ear than he’d expected and he jumped little in response. Cas’ hands kneaded into Dean’s back, pulling a yelp from Dean’s mouth. “We’re good here.”  
  
Dean caught Charlie’s eyes. She was watching Cas over Dean’s shoulder. Her face was tugged into an expression between confused, skeptical, and surprised, and, honestly, Dean didn’t want to worry about it at that moment.  
  
The sun was beating down; the air was cooling off. Cas’ hands were on Dean, and, for a brief moment, Dean could pretend that they could both see the rolling blues of the waves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, y'all should tell me all of your stories of planning outings in an "infuriating group messages" because even Amberly, my beta, was like "THIS IS SO TRUE" so... yeah....


	9. Extended Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean helps to move Anna's boxes to the car and prepares to say goodbye. :'(

Dean hefted a box into his arms, looking around Anna’s room. This was it. This was the end. Why was it over so soon? He’d only moved in next door a year ago – wow, a year ago – and it was already time to say goodbye.  
  
He looked out the window to the ground below. Charlie’s new-to-her, yellow Gremlin was sitting in the driveway with the back hatch open.  
  
Cas, Anna, and Charlie were leaving.  
  
Sighing, Dean turned toward the door to make his way out with the box.  
  
They were all going off to college. They were all leaving Dean.  
  
But, that could be good. Or, at least he kept telling himself that. This is just the first step toward Cas getting his colors, right?  
  
Dean still hadn’t been able to get any academically verifiable proof that his theory was even plausible. There was a huge chance that he was just broken. Huge. Cas could go off to college and meet some girl who gives him his colors. What would that mean for Dean?  
  
But, he wasn’t going to think about that. If he thought about it too much, he’d trip down the remainder of the staircase with a box of possible fragile things that belonged to Anna. Shaking his head, he shifted the box in his arms trying to figure out which step was the last step.  
  
Charlie came through the open door and waited for him to finish getting down the stairs before racing up them herself. “We’re on the last ones, Dean! Isn’t this exciting?”  
  
Her excitement was almost palpable while Dean’s was nonexistent. He plastered a small smile on his face, trying to be as encouraging as possible in his current state.  
  
“I need to get my towels,” Anna groaned.  
  
“Why didn’t you think about it before you packed them?”  
  
“Because I didn’t, okay?” Anna was pulling the boxes out of the truck, completely counterproductive to their goal. She placed them in two stacks at the back bumper. “Ah, this is the one.” She balanced the box between her thighs and the car.  
  
Putting the newest box down, Dean took a break from the packing, wiping the sweat from his forehead onto his jeans and crossing his arms over his chest. He was trying to memorize everyone.  
  
It wasn’t just that Cas was leaving. It was that all of them were leaving. They’d become Dean’s life, his family. Dean had his mother and his brother, but Cas and Anna and Charlie were just as important. It was the family he’d found. He’d managed to situate himself into their lives in such a way that it was perfectly domestic.  
  
He was losing his best confidant and his best friend ever and… well, Anna was something special too but Dean didn’t have a word for it.  
  
“Are you nervous about going? You don’t usually overlook these sorts of things.” Cas used a key from his key chain to cut the box open. He was looking at Anna with a concerned expression, wrinkles appearing the top of his nose from his eyebrows squeezing together.  
  
“I’ll get some tape to shut the box again.” Anything to get out of hefting another box quite yet. Dean spun around to go back into the house.  
  
With his back turned, his smile fell again. What was wrong with him? He should be excited for them. He should be out there encouraging Anna. Instead, he was inside the house being selfish and looking through the kitchen, looking for the patented junk drawer. No matter how immaculate the Miltons’ house was, they couldn’t be above having a junk drawer.  
  
Apparently they could.  
  
So, Dean started up the stairs hoping that between Cas’ and Anna’s packing there would be a roll of tape upstairs.  
  
“I got it.”  
  
Looking up, Dean had to freeze between the third and fourth steps because Anna was coming down, holding a roll of packing tape in one of her hands. “Oh, sorry. I went looking in the kitchen.” He quirked a brow and let a smirk creep onto his face. “You know, normal families keep this sort of shit in a junk drawer in the kitchen.”  
  
Anna waved the tape around in a nonchalant circle, before leveling her eyes with Dean and stating in a matter-of-fact tone, “Well excuse us. We keep our junk drawer in the study.” She slid past him and out the door. “But you’re not allowed in there.” She shrugged as she joked at Dean.  
  
She was like an older sister that Dean had never had or really wanted. Of course, he only realized that when she was about to leave. God, he was an idiot.  
  
It probably wouldn’t be so hard if he didn’t have his colors. It probably wouldn’t have turned out so difficult if he hadn’t let himself think of them as his long-lost family. He’d gotten used to the idea that Cas was his color match, that Charlie and Anna would be his sisters-in-law… sister-in-laws?? Whatever.  
  
He was just too naïve. How could he let himself get so relaxed about something so critical? Fuck.  
  
Charlie and Anna were at the car when Dean returned. Anna was scolding Charlie for doing such an ugly job of retaping the box shut.  
  
“Well, if it annoys you so much, you could just tape it again.” Charlie shrugged and held the tape out to Anna.  
  
When Dean caught sight of the box, he almost laughed. He ended up covering it with a cough since Anna was glaring at him. The tape spelled out ‘idiot’ across the box’s seam.  
  
Huffing at the both of them, Anna turned and stomped up to the driver’s seat and got to work fiddling with the CDs and USB cords.  
  
Dean and Charlie put the boxes back into the car. Charlie was having a field day. She was humming some Tetris-sounding tune and kept making a popping sound when they filled a line with boxes, even though the lines were more like bingo than like Tetris.  
  
Stepping back, Charlie wiped the back of her hand across her forehead. “Well, looks like we’ve got just enough room for the last box.” She smiled brightly.  
  
Come to think of it, Dean was struck with a question. “How will Cas get his stuff in there? Are you guys heading out early for a honeymoon or something?” He tried to make his tone teasing, especially with the last question, because he didn’t want them to know just how many emotions were attacking him. If Cas was sticking around a bit longer, Dean could make a better goodbye. It would also just delay the inevitable and make it super awkward because it would just be the two of them and –  
  
Cas emerged from the house and strode to the car. Dean stepped forward toward Charlie to make room for him to put the box into the perfectly-sized slot they’d left in the trunk.  
  
Returning from the front of the car, Anna stood next to Charlie, comfortably close. It was so nice that the two of them were so comfortable with each other that they basically could stand there as a single unit. Anna flicked her eyes from Charlie to Dean to somewhere behind Dean, presumably Cas. “Castiel, you didn’t tell him?”  
  
“Tell him what?” Charlie’s voice was still as excited and anxious as it had been all day, but suddenly a little trickle of skepticism had been present. She turned herself entirely toward her girlfriend. “What didn’t you tell me?” She looked shocked.  
  
Whispering, Anna turned Charlie away from the boys, seeming to want a private conversation.  
  
Dean could grant them that. He turned around to try to accommodate and was caught off-guard by a red-faced Castiel.  
  
He was biting his lip and flicking his eyes to look anywhere but at Dean. “I turned down my acceptance to the University of Washington.” He still wouldn’t look at Dean.  
  
“But why?” Was something wrong? What had happened? Cas had been over the moon with the news when his acceptance letter had come in the mail. He’d gone on and on for well over a week. It couldn’t be the money; was their mother sick or something? “You got the fancy gray scholarship and you were looking forward to going there. Why would you change your mind?” Dean’s mouth was hanging open, but he couldn’t seem to summon enough energy to close it, instead using the little energy he could muster to flick his eyes over Cas’ face looking for some sign.  
  
Cas shrugged and stared over Dean’s shoulder. “The scholarship money goes a lot further at a cheaper university, you know?”  
  
That sentence didn’t sound much like Cas. It was much too ambiguous? Uncertain? Castiel made every decision with purpose and a list of calculated risks. What was so important to Castiel that he was giving up on his top-choice university?  
  
What was so secretive that he didn’t want to tell Dean?  
  
Dean felt small, like he was a toddler and Castiel was a grown up telling him that he’d explain it when Dean was older. He wanted to know now, but he also didn’t want to touch the subject since it was obviously a rough spot. Directing his gaze downward, Dean resigned himself to not knowing. “Um, okay. So, uh, where are you going?” He sucked in a big breath, feeling like he wasn’t getting enough air in his lungs to continue this conversation. The bigger question came next. “When are you leaving?”  
  
“I’m not?”  
  
Blink. Dean slowly looked up to find Castiel pointedly looking up at the sky. His face was still pink, probably not fully recovered from the full red-face he’d had only a minute before. “You’re not?”  
  
It was Anna’s voice from behind him that spoke next. “He’s decided to go to KU.”  
  
But, that was where Dean was going. They were going to college together? Awesome! Wait. Not awesome. Cas was supposed to go off to college, get away from Dean, then come back and suddenly get his colors. How would that work if he wasn’t leaving? This was a disaster.  
  
But, if it was a disaster, why did Dean feel so happy?  
  
Because he’s lonely and selfish, that’s why.  
  
“I can always transfer to another university after two years or use the extra money to study abroad. Besides, it’s the medical school that really matters; I could get the preparatory degree anywhere. Heck, maybe I end up at Johns Hopkins or –”  
  
Anna paced around Dean and put a hand on her brother’s shoulder. “You’re rambling.” She was grinning when she turned to Dean. “So, I guess you’re gonna have to take care of him while we’re gone.”  
  
Snickering, Charlie grabbed Dean’s arms and leaned over one of his shoulders. “You have to feed him at least twice a day and walk him every morning.”  
  
“I’m older than all of you.” Cas turned away like a ruffled toddler. “I can take care of myself.”  
  
“It’s okay.” Dean smiled. “Extended family, right?”  
  
The air became static and Dean could have sworn that his ears popped.  
  
Charlie’s hands fell off of his arms as she retracted from him, like she was physically shocked by the electricity in the moment.  
  
Standing there with his mouth agape and his eyes wide, Castiel stared unblinkingly at Dean.  
  
Colors.  
  
All of the colors.  
  
Dean could see the different flecks of blue in Cas’ eyes. He could see the shifts in Cas’ skin tone over the plane of his cheek. He could see the muted browns and blacks of his hair under the sun.  
  
The world became defined by lowlights and highlights and tints and shades.  
  
Anna had stepped away from Castiel in much the same way as Charlie had from Dean. She was watching with wide, glimmering eyes, glimmering with little flecks of happiness that had different colors that Dean could identify.  
  
“Dean.” Cas’ voice was breath. It was light and ghostly and timid. “Your eyes are so green.” He lifted a hand and touched Dean’s face. “I mean, Anna told me they were green, but they’re greener than that.”  
  
So, Dean tends to ruin moods. “That made no sense,” he replied automatically; his brain was still rushing to catch up with everything that was going on.  
  
With that response, Cas’ hand began to fall from Dean’s face. His awed expression dented by a little twitch in his eyelids and a quirk at his lips.  
  
Shit. Shit. Dean scooped up Cas’ hand and put it back on his face. He opened his mouth, but he still had nothing to say. This was shit. He’d been practicing this. He’d known this would happened; at least, he’d hoped it would. He needed to say something. Anything. “I didn’t expect you to get your colors so soon.”

**Author's Note:**

> I take fanfiction commissions starting at $5 to help support my top surgery fund, please consider commissioning me!
> 
> Author's Tumblr: [feartheophanim](http://feartheophanim.tumblr.com)
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> Artist's Tumblr: [dragonpressgraphics](http://dragonpressgraphics.tumblr.com)
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> Beta's Tumblr: [ambersagen](http://ambersagen.tumblr.com)
> 
> ALSO: This work was selected for original publishing with some professional editing!!! I AM SO EXCITED. This means you can buy this work (with original names, professionally edited content, and an epilogue) in a physical book or as a Kindle ebook. You can find them on Amazon: Physical Book for $7 or [Kindle eBook for 99 cents](https://www.amazon.com/Extended-Family-Morven-Moeller-ebook/dp/B0728JJGG9/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8)


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